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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29708067">Past Life</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldheartedsky/pseuds/goldheartedsky'>goldheartedsky</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>That Original Lifeline [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bathing/Washing, Blow Jobs, Booker is the meat in a Joe/Nicky sandwich, Booker submits to the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known, Booker | Sebastian le Livre &amp; Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani Friendship, Bottom Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Bottom Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, But also, Denial of Feelings, Depressed Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Drinking to Cope, Emotional Constipation, Emotional Sex, Emotionally Repressed Booker, Everyone has their own secrets and baggage, Everyone is feeling the Guilt™️ in this Chili’s tonight, Hair Care as a form of Intimacy, Hand Jobs, How do you let yourself be loved when you are convinced you are unworthy?, Jewish Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Joe needs a hug real bad, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani and Nicky | Nicolò di Genova are in Love, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani is an Incurable Romantic, Love Confessions, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Riding, Road Trips, Separations, Set right after Shrike, Shower Sex, Sleeping Together, Threesome - M/M/M, Top Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Top Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, it’s what he deserves</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 17:26:43</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>20,987</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29708067</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldheartedsky/pseuds/goldheartedsky</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Booker startles awake from the brief grasp sleep had of him and looks at the bag, his bag, at his feet. Exhausted panic floods through his veins as he thinks, this is where it ends. But Joe’s dark eyes are as soft and gentle as ever when Booker looks up to meet them. “Come on,” Joe says, holding out a hand. “We need to go.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>His brow furrows. “What?” Booker slurs, fatigue making his syllables bleed into one another. “Where are we going?”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Home,” Joe says, plain as anything as he nudges the bag with his toes.</em>
</p><p>On the way back to Italy, Booker, Joe, and Nicky struggle to come to terms with their past, their present, and their future. There’s nothing certain except for one thing—each of them are holding onto more secrets than they want to admit.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Booker | Sebastien le Livre/Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Past Booker | Sebastien le Livre/Booker’s Wife</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>That Original Lifeline [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2183274</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>151</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>It’s finally happening! Shrike 2.0!!! I’ve been working on this for a long time and thank you so much to James for keeping me at this! I’m really excited to keep this going so I hope you all enjoy this!</p><p>Also, keeping up with the song themed fics/titles: this is very much based of the vibes of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HL1qNfVRiO0">Past Life</a>.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Booker’s head throbs with every heartbeat and he can barely keep his eyes open.</p><p>He’s been awake for God knows how long and it’s finally beginning to catch up with him. The room spins in circles and his throat feels raw from all the tears he’s kept himself from crying. His blood pounds in his ears so loudly that he can’t even hear Joe and Nicky’s soft conversation from the couch. They’ve been talking to each other for almost an hour and he wonders if they’ve rescinded their benevolence.</p><p>His eyes slip shut for just a moment.</p><p>
  <em>Thump.</em>
</p><p>Booker startles awake from the brief grasp sleep had on him and looks at the bag, his bag, at his feet. Exhausted panic floods through his veins as he thinks, <em>this is where it ends</em>. But Joe’s dark eyes are as soft and gentle as ever when Booker looks up to meet them. “Come on,” Joe says, holding out a hand. “We need to go.”</p><p>His brow furrows. “What?” Booker slurs, fatigue making his syllables bleed into one another. “Where are we going?”</p><p>“Home,” Joe says, plain as anything as he nudges the bag with his toes. “You and I are driving back to Sori while Nicky stays back to talk to Andy.”</p><p>His gaze drifts over to the Genoan—Nicky sitting on the edge of the couch, arms crossed tight over his chest. He’s not looking at either of them, Booker notes with an aching heart, and there’s a far off look in his pale eyes as Nicky stares a hole through the floor. The sharp pang of guilt suddenly erupts in Booker’s stomach and all he can do is nod, grab the handle of his bag, and haul himself to his feet.</p><p>It feels like there’s lead strapped to his feet when he stands, like all the blood in his body has congealed at his ankles. Booker flinches when Joe’s warm hand comes to rest at the base of his spine, leading him toward the door.</p><p>The hand drops when they pass Nicky, Joe sinking to his knees in front of the Italian. Booker cannot bear to watch the way his hands caress over Nicky’s strong forearms, the way Joe presses their foreheads together and murmurs words of a language only they understand. Nicky’s eyes flutter shut as they kiss, whatever silent promise they’ve made to each other flowing back and forth between their lips. “We’ll see you soon, Nicolò,” Joe whispers. “Give our sister my best.”</p><p>Booker watches the Adam’s apple break the smooth line of Nicky’s throat, bobbing as he struggles to swallow around it. He opens his mouth but no words spill free when he finds himself caught in the crossfire of Joe’s gaze—near-black eyes screaming a single warning word. Don’t. Not now. Not at the tenderest of their relationship or whatever it is they have.</p><p>So he keeps his silence until they’re safely in the cage of the Fiat. “Is Nicky okay?” he mumbles, staring at his open palms where they rest in his lap. Booker can hear Joe’s even breathing before the car putters to life, slow and steady like the tide. “Joe?”</p><p>“He’ll be fine,” he says curtly, pulling out onto the tight Moroccan street. “It’s just weighing heavily on his mind, telling Andy. It shouldn’t have had to be him, especially alone, but it’s better this way.”</p><p><em>Better if I’m not there,</em> Booker thinks as his fingers curl into fists.</p><p>“Stop that.” His eyelids sag as a hand slides across his leg, Joe’s slender fingers dipping into the warmth of his inner thigh. “I can hear you thinking from over here,” the older man says, squeezing gently. “Nicky is going to be fine. It was his idea to stay behind; he knows how Andy is better than any of us and wanted you to be safe.” Booker scrubs his fingers over his eyes and finally, finally, gives into the touch, wrapping his other hand around Joe’s.</p><p>It’s not like last night, needy and drunk and desperate, but merely reassuring. A lifeline in the storm. A simple reminder that Joe isn’t going anywhere.</p><p>“You should get some sleep, Sébastien,” Joe hums gently. “It’s a long drive.”</p><p>His stomach turns and he pulls his hand free. “Please don’t call me that,” Booker begs weakly, finally pulling the last bit of strength he has to look at the other man. Joe’s eyes are on the road but there’s no denying the sharp clench in his jaw, even behind the softness of his beard. “I just…I can’t. Not right now.”</p><p>It’s quiet for a few minutes and Booker wonders if he’s thrown it all away. Wonders if this small outburst of selfishness has cost him everything.</p><p>But Joe doesn’t move his hand away, only grips the tender muscle of his thigh hard enough to that it would leave bruises if Booker’s skin could hold such damage. “He <em>still</em> loves you, you know,” he says, voice uncharacteristically sharp. “Even after everything you done, after everything he told us, Nicky <em>still</em> loves you, Sébastien.”</p><p>A knife sinks into Booker’s heart and he can feel the blood pour through his ribs. “And you?”</p><p>“You think I would have stayed if I <em>didn’t</em>?” Joe snaps, as if the question hurts more than the answer. “You think I would have agreed to take you all the way to our house, to <em>our home</em>, if I didn’t love you so much that I thought my heart would break the moment the word ‘betray’ fell out of your mouth?” Booker’s breath catches and the dam of tears threatens to break for the first time since last night. Joe turns to him for the briefest of moments and catches his gaze before shaking his head. “You know, you’ve spent a lot of time convincing yourself that you’re unloveable when you’re far from it.”</p><p>“Would I have gone to such elaborate fucking lengths to try and kill myself if I didn’t believe it? You think I <em>wanted</em> to feel like this? I hated every minute of it, Joe.” His voice is trembling with every word and Booker honestly can’t tell if it’s out of anger or just because he’s so fucking tired that he can barely breathe.</p><p>The road turns to a blurry ocean in front of him and Booker has to blink a few times before he realizes it’s all in his head.</p><p>“I’m sure you hated it. You hated it enough to try and pull us all into your misguided plan,” Joe says, far too calmly for the situation. “You were willing to sacrifice the only people in the world who love you in exchange for empty promises. That mistake doesn’t come from anywhere but pain.” The car goes quiet again as they reach the outskirts of the city and the highway headed north. Booker’s skin crawls as he watches the desert pass them by, stomach dropping when he hears the other man sigh quietly. “I still don’t know how we missed it. How <em>I</em> missed it.”</p><p>“It’s not your fault,” Booker mutters, hesitantly finding his hand again. Nothing kills him more than the blame Joe is placing on himself. “I hid it well.”</p><p>Joe’s perfect artist hands clench simultaneously around the leather of the steering wheel and the meat of his thigh, his brow furrowing as the long, dark road stretches in front of him. “It doesn’t matter how good you hid it,” he says between clenched teeth. “You’re my best friend, Sébastien—you always have been. I should have <em>seen</em> it.”</p><p>And then, suddenly, the hand on his thigh turns—palm to the heaven as Joe’s fingers intertwine with Booker’s, grip no less tight than it was before. An apology and a promise, though both are silent. <em>I failed you once, let you slip once, but not again. Never again.</em></p><p>Held fast by the steady anchor of Joe’s hand in his, Booker finally allows himself to drift. His eyes slip closed and a heavy breath seeps from his lungs in an inching rush, chin sinking against his chest as he can no longer keep up the fight against sleep. It covers him like a rogue wave, not at all and suddenly all at once. His breathing evens and the last thing he can remember is the soft brush of Joe’s thumb against his own.</p><p>Then, darkness.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Booker jerks awake at a soft brush of fingertips against his arm.</p><p>There’s a faint memory of a dream still racing through his head but it’s gone before he can remember it fully. His chest heaves as he stares at the port building, trying to piece together how long he’s been asleep. Port of Tangier. Low-hanging sun. Late afternoon, early evening at best.</p><p>He turns to Joe, throat parched, and croaks, “How long was I out?”</p><p>“Eight or so hours, give or take. I stopped and got us tickets for the ferry already,” Joe murmurs, holding out a passport. “We just need to stop at customs quick before we go.”</p><p>Booker gratefully takes the bottle of water that the older man passes to him the moment they step out of the car, downing half in one go. His muscles feel atrophied from disuse, feel tight from being crammed in the small confines of the car, as he stands and cracks his back. “God, don’t ever let me sleep in that fucking car again,” Booker groans before finishing the rest of the water.</p><p>Joe laughs and throws an arm over his shoulder, squeezing the back of his neck tenderly. “Almost didn’t, given how loud you were snoring.”</p><p>It’s a joke, but a thin one. He knows how tired Joe is, how hard the gears of his mind are turning as he tries to balance the weight of both their worlds on his shoulders. Booker can see it in the shadows in his dark eyes, can feel it in the neediness of his grip. He’s not sure what amelioration he can offer at this point, what salve he can concoct with gentle eyes or a soft touch Booker can create out of thin air, but he has to give Joe something—if only so they don’t drift away from one another.</p><p>So when Joe’s hand drops from his shoulders, Booker catches it and presses the other man’s knuckles to his lips—all they can risk in a public place like that. But it’s enough. The worry lines that have creased Joe’s perfect face relax and a gentler smile crosses his lips. “Come on,” he whispers, “we’ve got a boat to catch.”</p><p>No matter how many times he finds himself on boats, it’s always the same feeling.</p><p>The slight nausea that rises in his throat the moment they hit open water that only goes away when he buries his head between his knees. Booker can feel Joe’s delicate fingers tracing aimless circles at the base of his spine where his shirt has ridden up in the back. “<em>Still</em> seasick? Even after all these years?” the older man chuckles softly.</p><p>“Even after all these years,” Booker groans, shivers rolling up his spine when Joe’s nails drag along his skin.</p><p>In a single instant, he’s dragged to last night—memories of Joe and Nicky’s mouth and hands digging him out of the pit of despair Booker had buried himself in with each tender caress. It still doesn’t feel real and maybe it isn’t, not really. Booker still doesn’t know what Nicky is possibly going to be able to tell Andy to soothe the blow of his betrayal. Maybe when he explains it to another person, an outsider, Nicky will realize that he isn’t worth the effort it takes to love him. Joe will follow soon—will always pick Nicky over anything and anyone else.</p><p>And then Booker will be back where he was. Alone.</p><p>“You’re thinking too loud again,” Joe says, shaking him out of his spiraling fears. “Breathe. It’ll all be over soon.”</p><p>If only he knew.</p><p>His stomach finally abandons him halfway through the ferry ride and Booker finds himself heaving stomach acid and nothing else into the cramped toilet stall, hands braced against the tight walls. He hasn’t eaten since last night and there’s little left in his stomach, but his body finds a way regardless. Boats remind him too much of the water and the water reminds him too much of drowning with Quynh night after night for two hundred years.</p><p>Seasickness yes, but also the taste of saltwater in his stomach and lungs and sinuses, of gasping for air and Quynh’s desperate rage.</p><p>His stomach turns again and this time, Booker sees the dark crimson streaks of fresh blood as he empties his stomach into the porcelain bowl. He can feel his esophagus tightening, trying to mend whatever raw part of it had opened itself from throwing up, and Booker struggles to keep the dizziness at bay.</p><p>Joe’s waiting for him on a bench just outside the bathroom door with another bottle of water which Booker shakes his head at. He lifts a brown bag and says, “I got us food, for after we dock.”</p><p>Booker’s brow pinches at the mention of food, willing his stomach to settle just enough for him to sit back down, but he still mutters a shaky, “Thanks.”</p><p>Thankfully the ferry ride is only an hour and a half—much shorter than some of the week-long expeditions he’s been forced into—but Booker can barely walk back to the car when it’s time to dock. “Are you going to be sick again?” Joe asks as they settle into their seats. He shakes his head, unwilling to open his mouth in case he’s not actually telling the truth. “We’ll take a break after we get out of the city, okay?”</p><p>He leans forward to rest his forearms on the dashboard, burying his face in the crook of his elbows, and grunts out a noise of affirmation.</p><p>He can tell the moment the ferry docks, the moment they hit solid ground, and it’s like a wave of relief washes over him. But he can’t bring himself to move for another twenty minutes until the car slows to a rolling stop and he hears Joe’s soft voice say, “Come on. You need to eat.”</p><p>The ground tilts at the rest stop as Booker stares up at the wash of red and orange paint across the sky, the sun beginning to set. There are the faintest pinpricks of stars in the dark navy behind his head, but not enough to make out fully. “Do you think Nicky has talked down Andy yet?” he asks as Joe sits down next to his hip.</p><p>“I don’t know. He hasn’t called since he sent me the message that Andy had arrived.” There’s a hesitation in his voice that gives Booker pause. He pushes himself up to look at the other man, finding Joe’s eyes already locked on him. “But before you ask, he’s <em>fine</em>. I wouldn’t have left Nicky behind if I didn’t trust him with this.”</p><p>“I’m sorry you had to leave him,” Booker mumbles. “I know you don’t like being separated.”</p><p>Every mission they’ve been on, every vacation they’ve taken, he’s never seen Joe and Nicky willingly leave each other for this long. And now it’ll be days before they reunite and it’s all his fault.</p><p>Joe doesn’t respond, only silently hands him one of the sandwiches from the paper bag in front of him.</p><p>They eat without much fanfare, Booker hunching over in the grass as he finishes off his sandwich. The sun begins to dip below the horizon before Joe finally crumples up the paper and stands, his left knee clicking like it sometimes does. It’s an old injury from before his immortality, he had said when Booker first noticed it around 1826, but never elaborated further than that. It usually only acts up when the cold becomes unbearable or the weather changes.</p><p>Booker wonders if there’s a storm coming.</p><p>He follows the older man back to the car, so hyper aware of the silence that his ears seem to ring with it. His words feel tight in his chest, filling his lungs so high that Booker is sure he’s going to drown in them. Joe does not reach for him when they get back on the road that maybe that hurts even more than the silence does.</p><p>Maybe it was a mistake—bringing up Nicky like he had. Joe can compartmentalize a lot—they all can—but Nicky was a different matter entirely. One mention and it seemed to all that mattered. Booker had come into the fold too late, was always too new, and struggled with never mattering enough to either of them for over two centuries. He should have gotten used to it, but never found that reconciliation.</p><p>What was a few more hours of that heavy feeling worth?</p><p>~~~</p><p>It’s late by the time they stop at a hotel just outside of Almería—almost midnight.</p><p>Booker drags both their bags into the lobby without Joe even having to ask. He can see the dark circles underneath his eyes, usually reserved for Nicky, and the guilt in his stomach opens up again for not offering to drive the last leg of the day.</p><p>But Joe still puts on a warm smile for the woman at the front desk, charming her with smooth, rapid-fire Spanish and a wink. The mask cracks however, when he turns back to Booker, keys in his hands. “I got us the last room,” he mutters, heading off down the hall towards the stairs as Booker follows behind.</p><p>The room is simple, small, but it’s a bed at least. He drops down on the edge and dumps the bags on the floor, shoulders sagging. Out of the corner of his eye, Booker watches Joe scrub his hands over his face and sigh. “You should go shower,” Joe says, voice cracking around the edges in exhaustion. “It’s probably been a while.”</p><p>“I can wait,” he mutters, “if you want to go first.”</p><p>Joe shakes his head, shrugging out of his jacket before tossing it on the chair. “I’m going to shower in Sori. I don’t want to worry about my hair tonight,” he says. “Just <em>go</em>, okay Book?”</p><p>Book. Not Sébastien.</p><p>He doesn’t even know if it’s intentional, but Booker feels the change so deeply that it feels like a knife straight through his diaphragm. A critical hit, bleeding out through cracked ribs before he can even find another breath. He stands on shaking legs, unable to look at the older man as he stumbles to the bathroom.</p><p>The ceiling is too short and the walls are so tight that if Booker stretched his arms out, he wouldn’t be able to extend them fully. He strips out of his clothes quickly, avoiding his reflection in the mirror. Even a day later, he can still feel Nicky and Joe’s fingerprints on his skin, though he knows there’s no marks. He can pinpoint every burning kiss, every grip they put on him. It makes him feel dirty, feel used, feel like he’ll never be able to feel whole again without it.</p><p>Steam rises from the shower and it burns his skin—water so hot that Booker is sure it’s causing blisters. But it’s a welcomed relief, letting it pour down over his head and across his face and shoulders.</p><p>He can feel his breath begin to stutter, can feel the wall he’s built around himself begin to crack and Booker can’t patch it quickly enough. Bracing a hand against the wall, he hangs his head and clenches his jaw tight. “<em>Ne casse pas…</em>” he breathes, every syllable trembling on his tongue.</p><p>A rush of cold air runs down his spine and Booker can barely look up fast enough before he finds himself pushed against the cool wall of the shower stall.</p><p>Joe’s eyes are dark as he crowds into Booker’s space, their bare skin pressed together. “You’re still hiding from me,” the older man whispers, running a warm hand over his slick chest. “How long are you going to keep running, Sébastien?”</p><p>“I’m not,” Booker croaks, his head falling back as Joe’s hot breath floods across his jaw, his neck. Burns every inch of skin it comes into contact with and he wonders if Joe can see the charred remains he is creating. His mouth falls open and his eyes flutter closed as the other man’s hand slides lower, across the hair on his stomach and down to the close-cropped curls at the base of his cock. “I’d—I’d n-never run from you…” he moans weakly as Joe closes his fist around him with a firm stroke.</p><p>“You’re running in your mind. I don’t know where you are but it’s not here with me.”</p><p>Booker knows he’s right, but every affirmation or protest dies on his lips as Joe kisses him roughly—all tongue and teeth and desperation. His thighs shake as Joe twists his wrist carefully, his long, perfectly delicate fingers curling around Booker’s cock with almost methodical concentration. “Joe…”</p><p>“It’s <em>okay</em> to want this,” Joe mumbles against his mouth, and there’s a note of melancholy in his voice that makes Booker’s heart sink into his burning stomach. “It’s okay to forgive yourself.”</p><p>How can he ever forgive himself when Booker isn’t even sure Joe has forgiven him, let alone Nicky, who has been forced to stay behind to clean up the mess he created. Nicky, who was the first to reach out with a favorite food and an old, nearly-forgotten nickname. Nicky, who was now alone.</p><p>Joe’s grip tightens and he bites down on Booker’s bottom lip hard enough to open the skin for a split second, making his breath go ragged. “Stop. Running.” His voice is low, strained, as he wedges his thigh between Booker’s legs, forcing them open as much as he can. “Come <em>back</em> to me, Sébastien. <em>Please</em>…”</p><p>Booker’s hands clench into fists and he would give anything to touch Joe the way he wants to.</p><p>But he can’t.</p><p>There’s no alcohol to give him strength, to quiet the deafening roar of his thoughts. No exhaustion to pretend that’s what he’s giving into. It’s just the rush of water around them, the taste of Joe on his tongue, and the suffocating need that’s flooding though his body. He wants to, God knows he wants to. But he just <em>can’t</em>.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Booker chokes as Joe runs a gentle thumbnail under the swollen head of his cock, right along the circumcision scar, and Booker knows he’s done for. There’s no way to stop the rush of his orgasm as it tears through his body—his abs clenching and his legs buckling—but Joe catches him either way, pressing him flush against the wall as he greedily swallows the broken sound that Booker cannot hold back.</p><p>This time, he doesn’t run.</p><p>He comes back into his trembling body slowly, the bridge of Joe’s perfect nose pressed against his cheek. Booker’s fists finally release and he can feel where his nails have bit into his palms, as sharp and raw as his heart feels.</p><p>“Sébastien,” Joe whispers over the roar of the shower, and his lips brush against Booker’s as his hand falls from between them. “Sébastien, look at me…”</p><p>Finally, finally, Booker’s eyes crack open and he’s blessed with the tender expression on Joe’s face. They’re close enough that he can pick out every freckle, even the one on the tip of the older man’s nose. Close enough that Booker could easily close the distance and kiss Joe the way he deserved to be kissed.</p><p>“There you ar—”</p><p>“I need you to go.” The words come out of his mouth before he can stop them and the moment they do, Booker instantly regrets them. Joe’s face falls, confusion clouding his beautiful brown eyes, and it makes Booker nauseous to see that heartbreak because of him. It’s too reminiscent of the moment he had first spoken of the betrayal and all Booker can do is croak a quiet, “I’m sorry, I just—I just need a minute.”</p><p>Joe’s hand reaches for his face, smoothes over his cheek and jaw, as he searches Booker’s eyes for an answer to a question he hasn’t asked yet. His bottom lip pulls in, his kiss-swollen mouth disappearing into his thick beard as Joe asks, “Are you going to come to bed soon?” Booker nods and Joe blinks quickly, a sharp breath of relief punching its way out of his chest.</p><p>He leans forward and captures Booker’s mouth once more—the kiss coming tenderly and hesitantly. Like Joe is afraid he’ll run again. But there’s nowhere to run, not now.</p><p>The moment Joe steps back, breaks that thread of contact, Booker feels his skin burn at every point the other man had held him just a moment ago. He stares at the water splattering around his feet as the shower curtain rings rattle and he is suddenly alone once more.</p><p>His breathing stutters—coming in double time now—and goosebumps rise on his arms and stomach as he steps back into the water. The spray scours his skin but there’s no way to wash the creeping guilt off his body. All Booker can think of is Nicky back in Marrakech and the aching hole of the Italian’s absence. He loves Joe so much that he can feel his soul bend under that weight, but he feels so utterly incomplete without Nicky here that Booker doesn’t know how he’s even still functioning.</p><p>Maybe he’s not.</p><p>Maybe he’s simply just going through the motions, waiting, until they’re all together again.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Booker can’t sleep that night.</p><p>Even with Joe curled around him, face buried in the back of his shoulder, Booker cannot find sleep.</p><p>He listens to the older man’s steady breathing, tries to concentrate on the heavy weight of Joe’s hand around his waist, but it’s not enough. Booker stares at the wall, mind swimming. He would kill for a drink right now, anything to quiet his racing thoughts, but there’s nothing in his bag, no mini-bar to raid.</p><p>His eyes flick over to the phone on the nightstand and he chews a fresh hole into the side of his cheek. A heavy breath slips from between Booker’s clenched teeth and he whispers, “<em>Fuck</em>.”</p><p>It takes some maneuvering, slipping out of the grip Joe has on him, but eventually Booker pulls himself free. He grabs his phone off the table and steps out onto the small balcony, the cool night air making the hair on his arms stand on end. Pacing around the tight space, he finally gives into temptation and pulls up Nicky’s number.</p><p>It rings for almost a minute before an automated voicemail message plays, followed by a loud beep.</p><p>Booker hesitates.</p><p>“Umm…Nicky, it’s me. It’s… it’s Booker…” His brow furrows and his eyes clench tight as he leans over the railing. “I know it’s late and you’re probably asleep, but I just needed to call you,” he says, voice shaking as he grips the phone in his hand. Booker’s heart is beating hard and fast inside his chest and he doesn’t know if it’s from nervousness or pure exhaustion. Maybe both. Maybe neither. Maybe he’s just drowning in this love and it’s finally the end for him. “I wish you were here, Nicky,” he whispers. “I don’t know how to do this without you. I don’t <em>want</em> to do this without you. I don’t think Joe does either. I just wish you could—”</p><p>His voice fails him when he hears the sharp beep of a call waiting and pulls the phone from his ear. His stomach bottoms out when he sees Nicky’s name next to the little flashing green circle and Booker can’t connect the call fast enough. “Sébastien?” His name comes crackling across the miles, Nicky’s voice soft from sleep and far more tender than Booker expects it to be. “Are you okay?”</p><p>“You didn’t call.”</p><p>Booker doesn’t know why it’s the first thing out of his mouth and he winces a little at his own tone, hoping Nicky doesn’t take it as sharply as it comes out. There’s a heavy pause before he hears the other man say, “I was waiting for you to reach out to me, Sébastien. I didn’t want—” Another pause, followed by a sigh. “You needed space.”</p><p>The strength of his legs finally gives out on him and Booker sinks to the floor of the balcony, resting his head in one hand. “Joe misses you,” he mutters. “More than he’s telling me, I think.”</p><p>“He’s never had to be without me. This is new for us,” Nicky says and there’s no denying the sadness in his voice. “But it’s a small price to pay to make sure we do this right with you. To make sure you’re taken care of.”</p><p>Booker feels the salt bite at his eyes and it takes him a moment to steady his voice enough not to let it show when he finally says, “I never wanted to do this to either of you. Joe’s worried about you and he’s worried about me and you’re worried about both of us. Now I feel like everything I do is just making it worse.” His fingers tangle in his hair and he wasn’t expecting this to hurt so much. His heart pounds high in his throat as he croaks, “I don’t know how to love you two in a way you’ll understand, especially after what I’ve done.”</p><p>There’s a rueful fondness in the other man’s voice as Nicky whispers, “Just stop running from us, Sébastien.”</p><p>A broken noise comes out of Booker’s mouth before he can stop it—more a sob than the laugh he means it to be—and he can’t clamp a trembling hand over his mouth fast enough. It’s everything he can do to keep himself from falling apart completely, grasping for every bit of strength he has left in his body. Joe’s words, breathed so tenderly against his lips, echo in Booker’s head and there’s nothing that could ever express how gone he is on these men.</p><p>“Sébastien?” Nicky’s voice is thick with worry, unable to hide it any longer. “Are you okay?”</p><p>Booker sniffs a little, wiping his eyes roughly with the heel of his hand, and nods. “Yeah, I just—Joe said the same thing a couple hours ago,” he mumbles. Even a thousand miles away from one another, Joe and Nicky are still one soul.</p><p>How could he ever be enough?</p><p>“Well, maybe you’ll finally get it through your thick, French skull,” the Genoan says, the faint notes of endearment tainting his lilting accent. Booker swallows what guilt he can as the steadiness of Nicky’s breathing settles his racing heart. Nicky’s voice softens, barely above a murmur, after a long and heavy silence. “I know this is hard. I know what it’s like to feel unworthy of someone’s affection,” he says. “I struggled with it for a very long time, knowing the man I was when Joe met me. But we deserve to be loved, Sébastien. <em>You</em> deserve to be loved, even if you can’t see it now.”</p><p>“What if I can’t come back from this? What if you and Joe never forgive me for what I’ve done?”</p><p>“Do you think we would be taking you home if we thought there was anything to forgive?” There’s no denying the guilt in Nicky’s voice and it weighs so heavily in Booker’s heart that he can feel his ribs crack under it. “If anything, we’re the ones that have to earn back your trust after we watched you slip, year after year, and did nothing about it.”</p><p>Booker curls further around the phone, burying his face in the crook of his elbow, and says, “It’s not your fault. And it’s not Joe’s. I should’ve—I should’ve come to you two.” He knows why he never came crawling to either of them at his lowest, though he thought about it countless times over the last two hundred years, and Nicky’s silence makes him think that the other man knows it as well. But it’s also that silence that is just a waiting game, the hole that can only be filled with that answer spoken out loud. So Booker sucks a trembling breath in through gritted teeth and finally admits, “I didn’t want to be a burden.”</p><p>“When we found you, you were starving, freezing, half out of your mind,” Nicky says. “It took weeks just for you to let us touch you, even though we were merely friends. We loved you for decades as a friend, as a brother, until that suddenly wasn’t enough.” His breathing is steady through the line but his words are insistent. “Never <em>once</em> have you been a burden to us, Sébastien.”</p><p>The city is quiet below him and a single word repeats itself over and over in Booker’s head, tumbling up and down his throat until he can no longer hold it back.</p><p>“When?” he croaks, unsure if he really wants the answer. “When did it change?”</p><p>The silence that descends goes on for so long that Booker wonders if his phone went dead. But then he hears Nicky’s soft, wondrous laugh and nothing else matters. “I think it was…Sanremo, just before the ‘60’s? Maybe ‘59.” Booker tries to think back to that year, that city, but his memories come up blank. “You had died that day—I can’t remember how—but we took shelter on the coast.”</p><p>Then, it comes in flashes. The sound of the waves. The smell of salt. The orange of the sky.</p><p>“I was washing the blood from your clothes in the water,” Nicky continues, “and Joe gave you his shirt. I remember that you had just begun learning Arabic and I could hear you laughing when you mispronounced the words. I looked over at you and Joe, the sun setting behind you both, and realized that there was no difference in the way I felt for either of you. I kept my silence, <em>terrified</em> about what this would mean, until that night. You fell asleep on the sand while the fire was still burning, right underneath the stars. I saw the way Joe looked at you—the way he <em>still</em> looks at you—and I just knew.”</p><p>Sixty years. Sixty years where he could have known, could have been told, could have been <em>loved</em>.</p><p>Sixty years, wasted.</p><p>The first tear seeps out, soaking his forearm, and there’s no more fight left in him. Time drags as Booker mourns for what he spent so long desperately aching for, something that was there the whole time and he had no idea. Nicky’s voice crackles over the phone, the Genoan whispering, “I’m sorry. I thought—we thought you would come when you were ready, if you even felt the same.”</p><p>“I was ready for a hundred and eighty years, Nicky,” he chokes, his world crumbling faster than he can patch it back together. He remembers that night—after his middle son Marcel passed and Joe and Nicky never left his side—and it seems like a lifetime ago. “All this time and I just—” Booker’s voice fails him and all he wants is to turn time back to the night before, when he was caught in a fleeting moment between these two men and had no promises of forever. “I need to go, Nicky. I…I can’t—”</p><p>“I understand, Sébastien,” Nicky whispers, trying and failing to hide his own heartache. “Take care of our Joe for me, <em>povero il mio libretto</em>. Love him like I would until I can come home to you both.”</p><p>Then, the phone line goes dead and Booker is left alone in the night air.</p><p>He doesn’t know how long he sits out there, but it’s long enough to steady the creeping sobs and make his legs prick with numbness when he finally stands. The room is still dark when he pushes the balcony door open, trying to make as little noise as possible as he steps over the threshold.</p><p>“Was that Nicky?” a tired voice asks from the bed, making Booker stop in his tracks. He looks up and sees Joe’s exhausted face staring at him through the darkness, one eye cracked open. “The phone,’ Joe mumbles again. “Nicky?”</p><p>Booker nods, dropping his cellphone back on the nightstand, and crawls back onto the bed. “Yeah, I called him. I think he’s okay,” he says, settling in to face Joe. Their noses brush against one another and finally, <em>finally</em>, Booker is the first to reach out and trace his fingertips over the faint pattern of freckles on Joe’s cheeks. His heart skips a beat when the older man’s dark lashes flutter, Joe leaning into his touch. The anxiousness recedes to a dull throb in Booker’s body as he whispers, “Nicky wanted me to make sure you got this,” before he closes the minute space between them and kisses Joe.</p><p>Joe lets out a heavy breath against his mouth, fingers tangling in the sleeve of Booker’s t-shirt as he pulls him closer. Their legs twist together and Joe’s tongue slips into his mouth and, for the first time in far too long, Booker’s mind goes quiet.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
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<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/><p><br/>
When he wakes up in the morning, Joe’s limbs winding around his own, it feels like a hangover coursing through his body.</p><p>His head throbs between his eyes, there’s a sick, nauseous feeling cramping deep into his stomach, and every inch of his body feels crusted and worn. Another shower doesn’t help—if anything, the running water on his face only makes the nausea worse. Booker packs up the hotel room, hair still dripping, until Joe finally stirs.</p><p>He pushes himself up groggily and doesn’t even open his eyes fully as he mumbles, “Sébastien? Wha’ time’s it?”</p><p>Booker looks up and tries to settle his swimming vision. “A bit after six,” he says as Joe finally unburies himself from the blankets. “Want me to drive a little bit today? I know you didn’t get a lot of sleep.”</p><p>“Neither d’you,” he points out. “After I have some coffee, I’ll be fine.” Joe yawns and rubs his eyes with the heel of his hand before peeling his shirt off. Booker’s mind fuzzes out for a split second at the stretch and pull of muscles in the older man’s shoulders and back before Joe digs out a clean t-shirt and tugs it over messy curls. “We should get going.”</p><p>They don’t talk much until they’re back in the car, Joe shoveling the last of the magdalena cookie he picked up at the bakery across the street into his mouth.</p><p>“Figured we’d stop in Marseille tonight, if you want,” he murmurs, shifting the gears and pulling out from the curb. “We can visit the cemetery before it gets dark if we don’t stop too much on the way.”</p><p>The cemetery. The grave. Heloise.</p><p>Booker looks over at the older man, Joe’s profile haloed in gold from the bright orange sunrise, and wonders how, <em>even now</em>, Joe is only thinking about him. The headache pounds again, bright and sharp between his eyes as he shakes his head. His stomach is still rolling but he can smell the lemon zest from the cookies clinging to Joe’s fingers and lips. Wants to kiss it away himself. “We don’t have to stop there,” Booker mumbles, staring at his clenched fists. “It’s fine.”</p><p>Joe huffs out a sigh and Booker catches the roll of his eyes before he scrubs a hand over his tired face. “You’re being stubborn again, Sébastien,” he grumbles. “You’re just as bad as Andy is sometimes.”</p><p>Booker flinches at the woman’s name and realizes it’s the first time she’s been brought up since they left the hotel in Marrakech. The enormous elephant in the room. There’s no way Nicky hasn’t told her yet and, if the stories about her rage after losing Quynh are true, there’s probably a trail of bodies littering the way all the way to the house in Sori where she’ll be there waiting for them.</p><p>He’ll gladly be the first casualty as long as she leaves Joe and Nicky out of it.</p><p>“She’s going to be angry with you for protecting me,” he mutters when they finally get out on the highway. “And with Nicky for staying and cleaning up the mess I left.”</p><p>“She’s our sister,” Joe says, never taking his eyes off the road. “There’s more history than you know about; from when it was the four of us and then when it was just the three of us. We were there when she lost everything, Sébastien, Andy doesn’t forget things like that.” His eyebrows furrow and Booker could choke on the tension in the car if he was even able to breathe. “If you hadn’t told us before, hadn’t given us a chance to put a stop to all this, maybe it would be different.”</p><p>Booker watches the road stretch on for miles in front of them, cars disappearing behind them, and wonders if that’s really true. Wonders how much forgiveness he’ll be allowed before his good graces run out. His relationship with Andy has always been close—even more so when he learned not to bring up Quynh in front of her, or at all really—but Booker would be a fool to pretend that this is going to change nothing. They’ve bonded over their loss, drank each other under the table more nights than he can count, wasted away in loneliness side by side, but there’s no way that Andy is going to welcome him back with open arms.</p><p>“She and I talked about it a lot, you know,” he mumbles, picking at the skin around his nails. “About trying to find a way out of our immortality.” Joe’s silence means everything and Booker wonders if this is the first time he’s heard of this. “None of this was ever just about me.”</p><p><em>I’m selfish, but not that selfish,</em> he thinks.</p><p>“Andy gets that way sometimes, we all do,” Joe says offhandedly, distractedly, like it’s all still sinking in.</p><p><em>Not like her, not like me,</em> Booker wants to say but he knows it’ll just cause more problems than it’s worth. Even prodding the truth out of the other man—that there’s no world where Joe would ever think for a minute about willing leaving Nicky behind for the allure of death—would just widen the chasm that’s suddenly growing between them even further.</p><p>His headache sharpens to a blistering point and Booker presses his thumb hard in the inner corner of his eye socket, desperate for any kind of relief. He sucks a shaky breath through his nose and gritted teeth and wishes he hadn’t left his flask back in the hotel in Morocco.</p><p>“Just breathe, Sébastien,” Joe whispers in Arabic, the softness in his voice curling into a long forgotten accent. “You’re going home.”</p><p>“Marseille isn’t home,” Booker echoes in matching dialect, stumbling a little over his pronunciation like he always does. “Not anymore.”</p><p>“Then where is?”</p><p>Is he a coward if he says <em>‘You’</em>? Screams <em>‘You and Nicky are the home I’ve never been allowed to set foot in’</em> until his voice turns raw and hoarse? Or is he a coward for choosing to shake his head instead, shrugging the question off with a dismissive, “I don’t know. Maybe nowhere.” Maybe he’s a coward for both—for swallowing the truth and spitting out only more lies.</p><p>“Somewhere is always home.” Joe isn’t looking at him but there’s no way Booker can miss the way the older man’s face tightens in worry. “It’s not always a place—Nicky’s been my home for longer than Mahdia ever was. Maybe we…” His quiet voice breaks as a shuddering breath slips from between his lips and Booker’s heart breaks as a single tear Joe’s cheek, disappearing into his beard. “Maybe someday you’ll think of us like that.”</p><p>“How long will you wait for me to get there?” Booker mumbles, even though the running thought in the back of his head is, <em>I’m already here.</em></p><p>Joe turns to him, dark eyes full of hopeful longing as he says, “Nicky and I will be there for you whenever you’re ready to find yourself over that threshold. We’ve waited for you before and we’ll wait again if we have to.”</p><p>Booker’s heart drops straight into his stomach and all he can think about is Sanremo. Of those sixty years that Joe and Nicky have loved him and kept their silence as firmly as he seems to be keeping his now. This is what got to into this problem they have now and yet none of them seem to be able to find a way out.</p><p>Andy has always joked that he is a self fulfilling prophesy, but it has never been more apparent than it is now.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Being back in Marseille always feels heavy, but the weight on his chest becomes overwhelming when they find themselves on their way to the cemetery.</p><p>He used to come every year on the anniversary of Heloise’s death, but after the first hundred years, it got to be too much. Then, it became every couple years. Then, once a decade. Then, not at all.</p><p>The last time Booker had been here was 1976 but nothing has changed since the day he had watched them put his beloved wife in the cold, hard earth. It had rained that day, if he remembers correctly—Jean-Pierre’s small hand nearly frozen in his own. But now, in the warm spring night, the air was calm and even as it blew in from the coast.</p><p>Joe doesn’t ask for directions but seems to know the path through the city, winding the car through the tight streets of Marseille. It’s getting late—the last light lingering in the skies in a dusky shade of pink and purple. Everything that passes him by is so familiar and foreign at the same time, as if he can remember the past life he led here but everything is distorted. A funhouse mirror of memories.</p><p>“You didn’t have to come with me,” Booker says, twisting a loose thread from the bottom hem of his shirt around his finger absentmindedly. “I could have gone on my own.”</p><p>Joe shrugs a little and offers him a small smile. “I didn’t have to, but you’ve come here alone more than enough times.” The silent reminder of, <em>‘I’m not leaving you again,’</em> passes between them, heavy enough for Booker to feel it feel his lungs. Strong enough to drown him in Joe’s resolve. But even under that heavy love, Booker still feels the bite of hot tears at his eyes when they stop in front of the cemetery walls. The rumbling of the old car goes silent as Joe cuts the engine, neither one of them willing to be the one to move first. “How long’s it been, Sébastien?” Joe whispers, staring straight ahead.</p><p>Booker sniffs, wiping his eyes with the heel of his hand. “Almost forty five years.”</p><p>His jaw clenches when he hears Joe swear in some ancient, foreign tongue, hard and heavy under his breath. “Forty fi—”</p><p>“Don’t. Please,” is all he manages in response. Booker doesn’t owe an explanation, not that he thinks Joe will ask for one, but he doesn’t want to try and piece together words enough to form the semblance of one.</p><p>The cemetery is quiet and he wonders how long they have until closing. There used to be no hours, no limit he was forced to abide by, and spent many a night stumbling down this same path, drunk out of his mind, to pass out at Heloise’s grave. And honestly, even now, he would kill for a drink at this moment—even more when Joe’s hand rests at the base of his spine, fingertips dipping into the back of Booker’s waistband.</p><p>“You don’t have to do this, you know,” he repeats as they wind their way through the cemetery path. “If it makes you…”</p><p>
  <em>Uncomfortable. Angry. Sad. Pity me. Any of the above?</em>
</p><p>Joe’s footsteps fall in line with his own as he says, “Sébastien, <em>stop</em>. If you want me to go, I’ll go, but you need to say it yourself. Stop trying to put words into my mouth and force me into something I don’t want to do.” His words are calm and steady but they bite in a way that can’t be ignored. A way that leaves teethmarks on the tenderest part of his soul and the shame in Booker’s heart eclipses the anxiousness.</p><p>The apology is on the tip of his tongue, heavy behind his teeth, but it never makes it past his lips. Booker knows it’s hurting Joe, can feel the pain radiating from the older man like heat from a fire, and still it doesn’t come.</p><p>Then, he sees it.</p><p>Tucked among the newer graves, he sees the familiar headstone. Booker pulls away from Joe’s touch, stumbling forward until he stands at the foot of Heloise’s tomb. He should have brought flowers. He should have brought a candle. Something, anything to make it seem like he actually cares for the woman he buried over two hundred years ago.</p><p>Booker still remembers her blonde hair as it wove through his fingers late at night, the way her dimples pulled at her cheeks when she smiled, the way they would whisper in Shuadit together when no one was listening, remembers all of it.</p><p>Now, nothing but fading memories.</p><p>A single, silent tear slips down Booker’s cheek as he kneels at Heloise’s grave, brushing away the decades of dirt and leaves that have accumulated on the stone slab. In another life, he would have been buried with her, would have sunk into the earth like he should have been allowed to, but the centuries have gone by and there is nothing to stop the next one coming.</p><p>“I knew Andy was going to find a way out,” he mutters, voice tight as he traces the carved numbers. Dirt clumps under his short nails as he clears them enough to be legible. “Andy would have gotten you and Nicky out of wherever they took us. And after you knew what I had done, you would’ve left me behind.”</p><p>“It was a shit plan,” Joe says from behind him. There’s a twinge of anger in his voice that hurts more than every death Booker has ever died. “We wouldn’t have left you behind.”</p><p>“<em>You</em> would’ve.” It doesn’t come out as an accusation and maybe it’s never meant to be. Booker glances up at the other man, heart sinking when Joe doesn't look at him. “If I had actually put Nicky in danger, had separated the two of you, and you knew about it? You would have left me behind. I know how much you love him, Joe. ”</p><p>“And I love you <em>too</em>, Sébastien,” Joe suddenly snaps, his brows knitting together in frustration. “I’m never going to pick either of you over the other, so don’t start making me try now.”</p><p>“So you’re going to honestly tell me that you love me <em>just</em> as much as Nicky, who you’ve spent almost a thousand years with?” Booker croaks, shame flooding up the back of his throat like stomach acid. “You think you can love more than one person at a time, <em>that much</em>?”</p><p>It’s a thought that kept him up at night for years.</p><p>When he would lie awake, stomach aching with guilt as he tried to reconcile the fact that the love for his wife had never dimmed, even as his devotion to Joe and Nicky grew into something uncontrollable. He couldn’t love them both, couldn’t love them all, even though Heloise had been gone eight years before he had even met the two men. Booker couldn’t love them all and he knows there’s no way Joe can love him as deeply as he loves Nicky.</p><p>It was all just another lie to keep him from slipping into the hole he dug himself, to placate his anxious heart.</p><p>He can see Joe’s jaw clench even through the corse thickness of his beard and he turns away from Booker without another word, crossing his arms tight over his chest. The fading light paints him in pale blues and yellows, washing his skin out and stealing his glow. <em>This is what I’ve done,</em> Booker thinks as he turns back at the tomb in front of him. More collateral damage.</p><p>“I had a wife, you know,” Joe says, almost so quietly that Booker can barely hear him, but the words still startle him enough to look up at the older man. There’s a far-off look in Joe’s dark eyes as he stares at Heloise’s grave. “Before I met Nicky.”</p><p>Booker feels his heart come to a careening halt in his chest, lungs shriveling to ash in his ribs. His brow furrows and he can’t think beyond the overwhelming confusion as he chokes, “<em>What?</em>”</p><p>Joe’s shoulders tighten, muscles roiling beneath his shirt, and worry lines appear on his forehead—tight and so deep that they could have been carved with a knife. “Her name was Salwa…” he murmurs as Booker shakily rises to his feet. “We were married young; I can still remember how beautiful she was on that day.” Joe’s bottom lip pulls beneath his mustache as he worries it with his teeth for a moment. “I loved her, Sébastien.”</p><p>“Why didn’t you <em>tell</em> me?”</p><p>It comes out more betrayed than he means it but Joe doesn’t even flinch. He only glances at Booker for the briefest of seconds and shrugs offhandedly. “I didn’t tell anyone—not Andy, not Quynh. Nicky’s the only one knows.”</p><p>Booker can’t move, can’t speak, can’t think, can’t focus on anything other than the secret that Joe has kept from him for so long. How long has this weighed on Joe’s mind? How heavy is it in his heart, after all these centuries, with only Nicky to help carry the weight of it? Did he mourn her when she died? Did he miss her at all?</p><p>“I should have told you sooner, I’m sorry.”</p><p>“Did you have a family?” The words feel heavy in his mouth but Booker forces them past his tongue and teeth regardless. Joe’s dark eyes are distant as he stares at the headstone in front of him, hands tucked deep into the pockets of his jeans. “Joe?”</p><p>“Almost. We tried.” A deep sigh falls from Joe’s mouth as he finally meets Booker’s eyes. “She was pregnant, twice. She lost the babies both times, just before they were born,” he says quietly, hesitant with his words. “Salwa felt the loss so deeply and I tried to grieve with her, but it never felt real to me. My mother said it was because women become mothers the moment they feel their children inside them, but men don’t become fathers until they can hold them in their arms.”</p><p>“You were there when I buried my sons.” Booker’s head is still reeling and every inch of his body feels numb.</p><p>“I had some experience with it, after burying my daughters.” The words cut to the core, puncturing his lungs. Joe finally reaches out a single hand for him and Booker stares at it or a split second before he shakes himself out of the trance he’s in and takes it carefully. His stomach flips when the older man runs his thumb over Booker’s knuckles. “I knew you would need someone there who you trusted—who cared. I should have told you then and I’m sorry I didn’t.”</p><p>Tears burn at the back of his throat and Booker can’t find the words to reach out across that divide, to comfort Joe if he needs any comforting at all. Maybe the years have worn it all away and the edges of Joe’s pain have dulled, while Booker’s are still as sharp as ever. But he can still offer a single olive branch, voice quiet as he says, “You would have made a good father.”</p><p>“It just wasn’t in the cards for me, <em>Allahu a’alam</em>,” Joe murmurs as he forces a small smile. “Salwa couldn’t bear the thought of losing another child and we stopped trying. I went to Jerusalem, fell in love with Nicky.” A breathless laugh escapes him as he shakes his head. “I though the hardest thing was going to be going back to my wife, explaining that I had fallen in love with a man I was supposed to hate. But the hardest part was having to see Salwa’s face and realize I didn’t love her any less.” Booker’s heart skips a beat when the older man squeezes his hand gently. “So yes, I <em>do</em> think you can love more than one person.”</p><p><em>I don’t know how to accept the fact I have loved you both for longer than I loved my wife,</em> Booker wants to say, but he doesn’t. Maybe it’s too painful of a thought to be spoken aloud now, or at any point here on out. So he keeps his silence.</p><p>Keeps his silence and allows his mind to travel back into the spiraling thought he’s had since the night before. Nicky and a hushed phone call and Sanremo.</p><p>A night on the beach. The crackling of a fire. The smell of salt clinging to skin.</p><p>The spark of love he missed and Booker can’t help but wonder if Joe is aware that he knows.</p><p>“I don’t want to stay in Marseille,” he finally says, breaking the unyielding silence between the two of them. “I just want to go home.”</p><p>Home to Sori, home to the house and the lemon tree, home to Nicky and Joe.</p><p>There’s a tiredness in Joe’s eyes when Booker meets his questioning stare, a worry that can never seem to be eased, but he still nods and steps forward to kiss him hesitantly. Joe’s free hand curls around the back of his neck, pulling him close and grounding him with one single touch. Booker’s eyes flutter shut and the breath he’s been holding for hours finally exits his lungs in one single rush.</p><p>The kiss breaks and Joe’s soft, warm voice whispers, “Then let’s go <em>home</em>, Sébastien.”</p><p>~~~</p><p>They drive straight through the night, the bright pink dawn seeping across the sky before they finally get to Genoa.</p><p>Booker isn’t even sure how he’s still awake, how Joe is still awake, but his body is screaming at him for some kind of reprieve. His legs are sore and his back hurts and his headache still hasn’t gone away and he is so goddamn tired. They haven’t said much to each other since the clock had read 1am, but he knows that whatever is building inside of him will come to a head at some point.</p><p>It feels like the knowledge is rotting inside of him—swelling in his heart and head until every seam strains. He has to tell Joe about what Nicky had divulged to him, whispered in quiet confidence for just his ears to hear, but Booker knows he won’t be able to hide his feelings as well as he could during Nicky’s call.</p><p>That anger, that heartbreak, those painful <em>sixty years</em>, are going to rear their ugly heads and it’s going to gnaw through whatever bridge they’ve managed to build.</p><p>It makes Booker sick, knowing there’s no way to stop it.</p><p>He watches the familiar city roads turn rural as they pass the city proper and find their way to Sori. The world is calm and quiet, still not having woken up yet, but there’s a storm raging inside the car. Booker wonders if Joe can feel it—the growing electricity like a lightning strike on its way. It’s going to destroy him. It’s going to destroy them both.</p><p>“When we get back, I’m going to call Nicky,” Joe says, his words slurring together with exhaustion. Booker nods and scrubs an anxious hand over his beard, heart burning up his throat as they make another turn. “Then we really need to get some sleep before he and Andy come,” Joe mumbles. “I’m so fucking tired.”</p><p>“I can make the guest room up,” Booker says offhandedly, picking his nails raw as his brows pinch together. “I know it probably hasn’t been used in a while.”</p><p>A silence falls that’s different than before. It creeps around his neck like a noose until Joe finally sighs and says, exhausted and exasperated, “Sébastien…”</p><p>“<em>Joe,</em>” he snaps back, wincing at how sharp and sarcastic it sounds.</p><p>The silence tightens again and Booker knows his breathing stops the moment they pull into a long driveway, the car slowing to a halt in front of that familiar house. The lemon tree peeks out from around the corner, the scattering of golden fruit dotting the green leaves like stars in the sky, and Booker remembers the sweet and sour taste of Nicky and Joe’s mouths in the cool of the Moroccan night.</p><p>Remembers the touch of their hands on his skin and the way they held him and the thought of losing it all will never get easier, will it?</p><p>“Sébastien?” His stomach knots as he looks at Joe—the other man’s dark eyes desperately searching his for some sort of answer. Some sort of sign that Booker still wants to be here. “Can I…” Joe’s hand reaches out for his face but stops just short, fingers brushing over the rabbiting pulse in his neck. His tongue darts out to wet his too-dry lips and a flash of exhausted devotion washes over Joe’s face, like he wants nothing more than to just crash over the space between them and kiss Booker until they’re both breathless with it. “Can we go inside?” he begs, voice cracking in tired despondence. “Please?”</p><p>Booker nods, pulling away from his touch and curling back in on himself once more.</p><p>Running like he always has—because it’s all he knows—because he’s a coward.</p><p>Joe keeps looking over his shoulder at him as they make their way up the front walkway, like he still has to make sure Booker will follow him over the threshold. The keys shake in his trembling hands as he fumbles the door open, Booker still keeping his distance.</p><p>“I’m sorry there’s not much here,” Joe mumbles, rubbing at his face as he steps into the house and slips his shoes off. The hallway is dark as Booker closes the door behind them, only Joe’s silhouette illuminated by the faint light coming through the windows in the kitchen. “We weren’t expecting to be back so soon.”</p><p>Booker glances at photos on the wall from simpler times—of Andy’s easy grin and Nicky’s bright eyes in the sunlight and his own far off expression as he stares out at the sea from the roof. He doesn’t know when the photo was taken, judging by his hair it was probably the seventies, but he’s not even sure he remembers the camera at all. It could have been Joe or it could have been Nicky or it could have been both of them and Booker had missed every second.</p><p>They had been passing each other in moments like this for years and all of it meant nothing.</p><p>“Joe…” he croaks, voice so barely audible that Booker barely hears it himself.</p><p>“I think there are still sheets on the bed,” Joe continues, not even paying attention as he pads into the kitchen and turns the lights on. He rubs his eyes and fumbles his phone out. “Fuck, Nicky’s probably not even awake. I’m going to have to leave a—”</p><p>“Joe…” Booker says again, standing in the doorway of the kitchen, arms limp at his side. </p><p>There’s panic in the older man’s eyes as Joe looks at him, dark circles staining his tawny skin. Joe looks older than he did when Booker had first seen him, standing outside the airport in Marrakech, and his shoulders sag as a shaky noise falls from his mouth. “Sébastien, please…”</p><p>“Nicky told me about Sanremo.”</p><p>Joe’s face falls the moment the words sink in—his brows pulling together and eyes going glassy. His chest heaves with a shuddering breath and he shakes his head. “It’s…you don’t understand…”</p><p>“How long were you planning on not telling me?” Booker spits, all the spiraling anger that has been eating him alive finally spilling out of him like pus from a wound. “Were you just going to let me think that that night in Marrakech was the first night you felt like that towards me? After how long I’ve been wanting both of you?!”</p><p>“Sébastien, you—it wasn’t like that…”</p><p>“<em>Sixty years</em>, Joe!” It comes ripping out of his throat like a sob and neither of them have moved from the spots they’ve cemented themselves in. “Sixty years and you let me drink myself to a dozen deaths because I was so fucking lonely that it seemed like the only way to make it stop for at least a few minutes!” His hands clench into fists and he’s so goddamn tired of feeling like he’s never been enough. “Do you have any idea how long I fucking waited?!”</p><p>Joe’s face flushes, the first tear spilling over his eyelashes. “It was only sixty years, you—”</p><p>“That’s a quarter of how long I’ve been alive, Joe!” Booker is shaking with this rage, heavy under his grief, and it’s too late to brush it aside any longer. “Sixty years is nothing to you and Nicky but it was <em>everything</em> to me!” After a thousand years, sixty years goes by in the blink of an eye, but Booker has felt every year so deeply that it’s like a whip leaving grooves in his spine. “I have been sitting here thinking that you and Nicky never thought of me as anything more than a brother, sitting here being <em>in love</em> with you both since 183-<em>fucking</em>-9, and you just <em>let</em> me. Like you never even fucking cared!”</p><p>“We thought you would come if you felt the same!” the other man pleads desperately. Joe’s trembling as badly as he is but for vastly opposing reasons. “We didn’t…how could we have made it any clearer before?”</p><p>“You two made it pretty fucking obvious in Marrakech.”</p><p>The words hit Joe like a slap in the face, exhausted tears carving canyons in his skin. “We <em>wanted</em> you. We <em>loved</em> you. I d-don’t—” A broken noise dies in the back of his throat as he looks at Booker defeatedly. “I don’t know why it took so long… I’m <em>sorry</em>…”</p><p>“I was there the <em>entire time</em>, Joe,” Booker chokes, the words heavy in his throat. “The only way you couldn’t have seen it is if you and Nicky <em>chose</em> not to see it.”</p><p>Every bottled emotion floods out of Joe’s heart as it not just cracks, but shatters. It’s like watching a burned-out house crumble into ash before his very eyes—the way Joe just collapses in on himself. The night sky of his eyes turns into a hollow black hole, sucking all the light and joy from his face as Joe stumbles forward half a step. “Sébastien…”</p><p>He can’t do this. Booker can’t stand and watch this destruction happen right in front of him, knowing that he could have just avoided the whole thing by keeping his mouth shut like he’s been managing to do for decades.</p><p>Shaking his head, he steps back towards the bedroom. Another retreat.</p><p>“<em>S-Sébastien</em>…” Joe begs, sharp as a sob, blinking back tears as Booker takes another step back. “S-Sébastien...<em>p-please</em>…”</p><p>Every inch of Booker’s body feels numb as he turns away from Joe—his best friend, his love, half of his everything—and walks down the hallway, alone. His hands shake as he closes the door to the guest room, locking it behind him. His ears ring with the broken sound of his name falling from Joe’s mouth and he wishes he felt as hurt as he knows the other man is. He’s not even crying, for God’s sake. He hasn’t cried like Joe has, like Nicky has, and Booker is so aware of how it seems.</p><p>Like what he’s done hasn’t mattered at all.</p><p>He collapses on the edge of the bare bed, head falling heavily in his hands, and struggles to find solitude. His heart stops, lungs still, and the world comes to a standstill beneath him.</p><p>All that’s left is the coming free fall.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Little bit of a shorter chapter this time but I wanted to make sure Joe’s story didn’t get lost in a long chapter 🤧</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/><p> </p><p>It’s hours before Joe comes to the door, the knob rattling quietly.</p><p>“Sébastien?” he mumbles, soft voice cracking as he knocks on the door gently. “I have to—I have to go pick up Nicky and Andy from the airport. Are you—” Booker raises his head, staring at the door as a shaking breath echoes from the hallway. “Are you going to come with me?”</p><p>Booker digs the heels of his hands into the sockets of his bleary eyes and doesn’t move, doesn’t answer, doesn’t do anything but sit there.</p><p>Joe sighs and whispers, “Okay, I—<em>we’ll</em> be back soon and I hope you’ll at least talk to Nicky, even if you don’t want to talk to me.” There’s such immeasurable sadness in his voice that another knife plunges deep into the tender space deep inside Booker, crowding in with all the others. “I <em>love</em> you, Sébastien,” the muffled voice says again. “Please just…just remember that.”</p><p>The lump in Booker’s throat bobs as he swallows thickly, listening to Joe’s retreating footsteps. If he tries hard enough, he can hear the car door slam out front, the engine turning over.</p><p>And finally, he’s alone.</p><p>More alone than he had been in Auckland because he knows what he’s giving up now, what he’s pushing away. Andy will return, furious with him, and Nicky will see what Booker has done to Joe in his absence and the grace he’s been given will run out. They’ll come back and this will no longer be the home Booker thought it would be.</p><p>He has to leave.</p><p>If he sits and waits for the inevitable, there’s no going back from this. He’s left once and he’ll leave again, and hopefully it’s early enough into whatever he has with Joe and Nicky that they won’t miss him.</p><p>The sky is a dusty shade of blue as he finally stumbles out the front door, the cool wind from the sea blowing across his flushed face. Booker’s legs feel weak carrying him down the road and he has no idea where he’s even going at this point, but the only thought is <em>“Go.”</em> Go somewhere, go anywhere, just go away.</p><p>So he walks along the road, along the coast until the city floods in front of him and he can find a place to hide.</p><p>Booker knows where they’ll look for him—a bar or somewhere small and quiet where he can soften the near-constant screaming in his mind—so he goes where he knows they won’t bother.</p><p>The club is crowded and he disappears easily, pushing through jostling bodies toward the bar. He hasn’t had a drink since Morocco and Booker wonders if the tremble in his hands is from that fact or his all-encompassing exhaustion. How long has he been awake? How long has it been since Joe returned with Andy and Nicky and found him gone? He drops down and motions to the bartender for a drink, his mind still racing in that horrible loop.</p><p>Andy. Nicky. Joe. Sanremo. 1839.</p><p>The plan with Copley didn’t work but this is death enough.</p><p>Andy. Sanremo. <em>Nicky.</em> 1839. <em>Joe.</em></p><p>The hours seep together and all the lights around him begin to blur together in a sea of colors—bass thumping in the back of his skull as Booker curls his hand around the glass.</p><p>He’s lost count of how many drinks he’s ordered, but he knows the tab has run up over a hundred euros. Money’s not a problem; he’ll spend it for as long as he has to to keep from facing the judgement awaiting him back home.</p><p>Maybe if he drinks himself sick as he always does, Joe and Nicky will finally come around to the face that they don’t want him around like they think they do. Booker’s never been good enough for them, not for two hundred years, how could he have thought that it would be any different now?</p><p>His shoulders curl in on himself, his armor going up once more, and Booker motions for a refill.</p><p>He doesn’t know how long he’s there. It could be hours, could be minutes, but he’s there long enough for his eyelids to grow heavy, his elbows braced against the top of the bar. He’s there long enough for the bartender to start giving him worried glances. Long enough not to notice the single hand that brushes over the back of his neck until it’s too late.</p><p>“<em>Libretto</em>…”</p><p>The pet name comes out softly, gently, whispered in his ear as only a lover could, and Booker nearly falls off his seat as he whips around to look at the man behind him. Nicky’s profile is sharp against the wash of lights behind him, pale-blue eyes glowing silver in the darkness as a faint smile pulls on his Cupid’s bow of a mouth. A heavy breath claws its way from deep inside the crevices of Booker’s chest and he chokes, “<em>Nicky</em>…”</p><p>“It really didn’t get through to you, did it?” Nicky says, the low timbre of his voice barely audible over the club music. The hand around the back of Booker’s neck holds fast as the other comes up to cup his face. His cheeks burn hot as Nicky shakes his head, tired eyes full of worry. “Where <em>are</em> you, Sébastien?”</p><p>It’s a loaded question and one that he isn’t even sure he has an answer to. <em>Running,</em> he thinks. <em>Hiding from you and Joe,</em> he thinks. Nicky seems to read his face, his mind as Booker sags into his touch. “I’m sorry,” he croaks, chin quivering as his vision goes blurry with held-back tears. “I’m sorry for—” The word <em>‘everything’</em> dies on his lips but Booker knows Nicky hears it anyway. His hands wrap around the Genoan’s wrists, so desperate to keep him close, so desperate to pull him closer that he can barely stomach it. “I’m s-sorry.”</p><p>Nicky ducks in close, pressing their foreheads together as his grip tightens to the point of pain. “Please stop apologizing, Sébastien. <em>Please</em>,” he begs, as desperate as Booker is and at least twice as hollowly tired. “We just want you to come home.”</p><p>“Joe doesn’t want to see—”</p><p>“We <em>both</em> want you home,” Nicky insists, his nose pressing against the dark wash of skin under Booker’s eyes. “He needs you back. <em>I</em> need you back. We’ve all waited too long just to have you run from us again.”</p><p>“But Andy—”</p><p>“Come <em>home</em>.” It’s a song, it’s a prayer, slipping from Nicky’s hallowed mouth across the minute space into his own. “Come home, <em>libretto mio</em>. <em>Come back to us.</em>”</p><p>Booker knows, the moment he lets his guard own, the moment he lets them in fully, there’s no go going back. He will have them and they will own his heart, his body, his soul for however long eternity lasts for them. It’s a terrifying thought—being known that deeply—but maybe it’s a good fear.</p><p>If it has to be anyone, he wants it to be <em>them</em>.</p><p>The world shifts below him as he allows Nicky to drag him off the bar stool, their faces still pressed so close together that all he can see is those beautiful moon-blue eyes staring back into his soul. Come, he hears—no, feels—pouring off of Nicky’s lips as they wind their way back through the dance floor. Come, you’re safe now.</p><p>The lights spin around them and Booker feels his breathing grow more and more shallow until it nearly stops entirely. All he knows is this, all he wants is this. Nicky’s thumb brushes over the line of his jaw, tender and adoring, and Booker melts under him without a second thought.</p><p>There are dancing bodies all around, noise and music and laughter, but here, it is is quiet. Here, there is nothing but him and Nicky and nothing else. They stumble to a stop in the middle of the swirling hurricane and Nicky’s mouth brushes over Booker’s. He’s always been a little shorter, always had to rock up on his toes a hair to hug Booker, but the heaviness has pulled Booker so low that it’s not the case this time. Now, they are equals. Now, all Nicky has to do is hold him close and whisper, “You are <em>so</em> loved, Sébastien. I pray you can see it now.”</p><p>Booker’s eyes flutter shut as Nicky kisses him deeply, tongue slipping into his half-open mouth easily.</p><p>The light behind his eyelids dances in a symphony of color, Nicky’s chorusing taste leeching deep into his mouth, his throat. Tears leak out the corners of Booker’s eyes and he swears his heart stops in his chest as he clings to the other man desperately. Nicky kisses him hard, relentlessly, and underneath his own scent, there is the undeniable bite of Joe’s cologne that Booker cannot ignore.</p><p>It makes him homesick, empty, and it begins to sink in how incomplete he will be without both men at his side.</p><p>He needs Joe too.</p><p>But first, he has to face Andy’s wrath.</p><p>~~~</p><p>The short drive back is silent, his hand tucked tight in Nicky’s strong grip.</p><p>There are lights on in the house, flooding across the yard in golden swathes, and it sends Booker’s heart racing inside his chest once more. Nicky tightens his hold on his fingers and palm as they pull up to the house, and whispers, “It’s going to be okay, I promise.”</p><p>It’s a pacifying lie if he’s ever heard one, but there’s no backing out now.</p><p>“Go around the back,” Nicky murmurs, pulling Booker’s hand to his mouth and pressing a tender kiss to his knuckles. “I’ll go talk to Andy.”</p><p>Booker nods, pulling his hand free and fumbling with the door. His legs move on autopilot, sending him stumbling around the house and out into the sloping hills of the backyard. The air hangs heavy with the tangy scent of the low-hanging fruit and Booker can nearly taste it as he passes by the lemon tree. His legs give out as he passes the small garden, dropping to the grass with a shaky breath.</p><p>The moon is flickering in and out of the low hanging clouds, the light flashing across the far-off sea. Booker’s hands tremble as he scrubs them over his knees, heart slamming high in the back of his throat. His breath comes hard and fast through his nostrils as he hears a door open and close behind him, footsteps crunching through the spring grass.</p><p>He clenches his jaw and hangs his head as Andy sits beside him, shoulder to shoulder. They sit in silence for a while, the chorus of the crickets the only sound echoing around the house. Booker is so tired, so worn, that he can’t help but let his shoulders curl in further, shielding him from the eventual fire he knows is coming. He knows Andy. He knows how she gets, how she is, how long she can hold onto that rage.</p><p>But instead, all that comes is a quiet and gentle, “Hey, Book.”</p><p>Booker chews a hole open on the inside of his lower lip, blood flooding between his teeth, and feels the first tear falls down his cheek. “H-Hey, Boss.”</p><p>A warm hand smoothes over the back of his neck, Andy’s touch steady as she says, “You really fucked this one up, didn’t you?” Her thumb brushes under the thin skin behind his ear, the tender motion so unexpected, and the dam breaks all at once.</p><p>The first sob rips his chest in two, torn open so wide that the sound barely comes out at all. The tears come so hard, so quickly that Booker is sure he is drowning in it. They run down his cheeks, his nose, pooling in his open mouth until all he can taste is salt. He’s sick with it—gasping for air like he’s a thousand meters underwater, perishing alongside Quynh like he’s done for centuries—but this time is different. This time it’s him and no one to blame but himself.</p><p>Andy holds him fast, never letting him go, never letting him drift, but allows him the flood of grief Booker has been holding back for far too long. Grief of what he’s lost, what he’s gained, and everything in between. He’s never wanted to be weak, to be seen as a burden, but <em>God</em>, has he been <em>so exhausted</em> holding it all back.</p><p>Booker can’t even catch his breath long enough to begin to apologize but Andy pushes that aside, drawing him close in a tight embrace. “We don’t get a say in when it ends, Book, you know that. We never have,” Andy says as he buries his face in her shoulder. Her hand comes up to cradle the back of his head and Booker feels another wave course through him like water through sand. “But we can control how we live,” she says, voice unnaturally tight as his arms come up around her shoulders as well. “And to be honest, Book, you and I? We’ve been doing a shit job of it.”</p><p>“I sh-should’ve t-told you,” he stammers. “I didn’t—c-couldn’t go on l-like this…”</p><p>“And leave <em>me</em> behind?” Andy chuckles, sounding almost as tired as he does. “Leave the two men you love behind?”</p><p>Booker scrambles out of her grasp so quickly that he almost falls over, eyes going wide in panic.There’s a calmness in Andy’s expression that he knows only comes with thousands of years of living—like she’s seeing right through him, or maybe, just maybe, for the first time ever.</p><p>“Nicky told me everything, Book.”</p><p>He shakes his head, still gasping through sobs as he fumbles for words. “Andy, it’s n-not—”</p><p>“I really should have seen it coming, you know,” she murmurs, a fond smile pulling at her lips. “I watched those two dance around each other for years, even after we…after I found them, but I just never thought you would be involved.”</p><p>Her form swims as Booker blinks back tears, gulping for air. “I d-don’t…” He scrubs his hands over his face roughly, calluses scraping across the raw skin. Andy’s hand touches his arm and it feels worse than every death he’s ever had. It feels like hours before he finally chokes, the words agonizing in his throat, “I d-don’t know h-how to love them…”</p><p>Andy’s grip tightens and she lets out a short, huffing laugh. “You already <em>do</em>, Book. It’s really not that hard.”</p><p>“But they d-don’t—”</p><p>She pulls his hands from his face, baring him to the world, and Booker’s shuddering cries turn into heavy breaths, coming in a staccato triple time. “<em>They do</em>. They love you more than you know or want to admit, you just have to fucking <em>let them do it</em>, you asshole,” she says, shaking him gently. “You’re too young to end up like me, Book.”</p><p>His gaze drifts back over his shoulder to the faint glow of the windows and Booker feels another tear cut down his cheek. “I’m fucking <em>scared</em>, Andy…”</p><p>Andy’s smile widens just a hair, crinkles forming at the corners of her eyes as her thumbs brush over the racing pulse points in his wrists. “Good, you <em>should</em> be,” she murmurs fondly before patting his cheek. “Now go talk to them before I have to end up dealing with any more of the shit you leave behind.”</p><p>Booker stands on weak legs, giving Andy one last look before turning towards the house.</p><p>It’s quiet inside, almost too quiet, and Booker slips his shoes off the moment he steps over the threshold. His feet pad softly over the tiled floors, through the living room and dining room, and down the hall. He can hear muffled voices at the end of the hall, the sharp sound of held-back sobs, and Booker can feel his heart plummet straight into his stomach.</p><p>“Shhh, <em>amore mio</em>, it’s alright,” Nicky’s gentle voice purrs, muffled behind the bathroom door.</p><p>There’s a splash of water and a muffled sob, then Joe’s trembling voice choking, “N-No, I—it’s <em>n-not</em> okay, Nicky.” There’s another sob, sharper and more hollow this time. “He w-wouldn’t—wouldn’t even <em>t-touch</em> me. We were t-too late. We w-waited too long…”</p><p>“He’s going to come around, Joe, I promise. We just…we just have to give him some time. This has been hard on all of us.”</p><p>Booker’s palm presses against the cool wood as he steps up close, resting his forehead against the door. “I c-can’t love him any h-harder,” Joe weeps. “I tried, N-Nicky, I t-tried.”There’s a weak sniffle and Booker’s throat tightens so much that he can barely breathe. “I d-don’t know what else t-to do…”</p><p>A quiet sigh slips out before Nicky murmurs, “All we can do is what we decided before Marrakech. We just have to love Sébastien and hope he sees it someday. Hope he decides his heart will be safe with us.”</p><p>“I can’t—I c-can’t lose him, Nicky…”</p><p>He closes his eyes tight and sucks a deep breath in through his nose, steadying himself. Booker has to do this now, has to deal with this fallout now before it eats through each of them in sharp succession. He doesn’t even know if Joe will forgive him for what he said, if Nicky will touch his face like he had done at the club, if they will allow Booker to be spread underneath them like they did in Morocco.</p><p>But he has to try.</p><p>His knuckles rap against the door as Booker knocks gently, muttering, “Can—can I come in?”</p><p>It’s silent for a moment before the door opens just a crack, allowing him enough space to push inside. Nicky settles back down onto the edge of the tub, running a hand over Joe’s bare back as he offers Booker a careful smile. The older man has his knees drawn up against his chest, face buried and hidden away, and doesn’t look up when Booker steps over the threshold. “Did you talk to Andy?” Nicky asks, a flash of relief washing over his face as Booker nods.</p><p>“Yeah, we talked,” he mumbles crossing the bathroom to kneel next to the tub and Nicky’s feet. Booker drops his forehead onto the expanse of the Genoan’s thigh and lets out a heavy breath as Nicky combs through his hair gently. He turns his head, staring at the mess of damp curls poking up from underneath Joe’s arms, and feels a wet tear pool at the inner corner of his eye. “Joe?” Booker croaks, the reality of how exhausted he is finally setting in. “Joe?”</p><p>“Shhh,” Nicky murmurs, his left hand stilling in Booker’s hair and his right reaching out to sink his fingers deep into Joe’s curls. “He’s okay, Sébastien, I promise.” His head tilts towards Joe, his touch smoothing down the back of his neck. “Come on, <em>amore mio</em>, let’s get you dried off.”</p><p>Booker shifts, inching away from Nicky, and mutters, “I can go—I can wait in the—”</p><p>Nicky’s blue eyes halt him in his motion and he shakes his head. “Stay—please, Sébastien, <em>stay</em>. You can help me with Joe’s hair.”</p><p>And that’s how Booker finds himself, hunched on the edge of the tub, as Joe sits on the floor in front of him, back turned. Nicky’s concentrating in a way that looks so similar to the focus he gets during missions as he runs a wide tooth comb through Joe’s hair, gently working through all the tangles.</p><p>The smell of shea and hair oil permeates through the air, clinging to his hands and Joe’s scalp as Booker twists the soft curls into individual pieces. He’s never realized how soft Joe’s hair is, how easily it relaxes the older man—Joe’s shoulders sagging and his breathing going slow and deep—but it’s sending sparks up Booker’s spine. Even more so when Nicky catches his gaze. “You’re doing good, Sébastien,” he hums, setting down the comb and reaching for the oil. “It takes some practice, I know.”</p><p>Booker has seen Nicky do it over the years but he’s never been invited into this intimate ritual and he knows how much of a gift it is.</p><p>His hand brushes over the back of Joe’s neck and Booker feels the older man shiver under his touch. “We’re almost done, Joe,” Nicky says, rolling each curl between his fingers in quick, practiced ease. “Then we can go back to our room.”</p><p>Booker’s fingers still in Joe’s hair, thumb on the thin skin behind his ear, and his voice is barely audible as he croaks, “You still want me there?”</p><p>Joe’s hand comes up to wrap around his wrist, the older man turning to look at him with bloodshot, desperate eyes. His long, artist’s fingers hold fast to Booker’s arm, pulling him close so their faces are inches from one another. The stars flicker in those night-sky eyes of Joe’s, as if they’re struggling to be seen, and the fear pours off the older man in waves. “Of course we do,” Joe promises, voice dry and hollow as he knocks their foreheads together gently. “We always <em>have</em>, Sébastien.”</p><p>Nicky’s hand brushes over his jaw, the side of his neck, and Booker’s eyes flutter shut as he sinks into their love.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Little bit of a short chapter again but the next one will be much longer and much spicier 😈</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So this fic has been bumped up to an Explicit rating so be forewarned before you jump into this chapter because it’s pure emotional filth.</p><p>Hope y’all enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <hr/><p> </p><p>Booker will never grow tired of this—watching Joe and Nicky kiss.</p><p>The way Joe melts in Nicky’s arms, eyes closed and mouth open as the Genoan licks into it shamelessly. The way his long fingers grip Nicky’s shoulders, holding steady as Joe rocks their hips together. Booker grips the sheets, stripped down into only his underwear, and just stares in awe at these two men.</p><p>How did he get so lucky? How could he have been blessed enough to earn this?</p><p>Whatever it is, he’s done asking questions and is ready to accept this grace.</p><p>Nicky kisses his way down Joe’s neck, trailing over bare collarbones as his hands smooth over his flank and around his waist. He’s whispering something in a language Booker can’t understand but, whatever it is, it makes a low groan slip from Joe’s flushed throat. “Nicolò,” he breathes before suddenly dropping a hand to reach for Booker. “Sébastien…”</p><p>“I’m here,” Booker murmurs, lacing their fingers together as Joe’s eyes flutter open. “I’m not going anywhere.”</p><p>Relief floods across Joe’s face as Nicky moves lower, mouthing over his nipple. Booker holds fast to his hand as he watches the Italian sink to his knees, licking and kissing at the fine hair on Joe’s abs. “I know it’s been a long day, my love, but I want you to look at me.” Joe’s heavy gaze breaks with Booker’s as he looks at Nicky, waiting for orders. “I want you to watch as I open Sébastien up, watch as I get him ready for you, and then I want to see how much you love him,” Nicky purrs against warm skin. “Can you do that for me, Joe?”</p><p>A rush of heat throbs low in his groin as Booker thinks of the idea. A complete role reversal from that first night in Marrakech. His mind wanders to the idea of Nicky’s thick fingers inside him, the weight of Joe’s strong body on top of him, and how could his skin not scorch at the mere thought of it?</p><p>“Yes,” Joe pants, squeezing Booker’s fingers tight as his towel is unwrapped from around his waist and dropped to the floor without a second thought. “Yes, anything.”</p><p>Nicky catches Booker’s gaze as he rises back to his feet, a hidden smirk on his face as he strips his own t-shirt off. He gives Joe one last heated kiss before turning to occupy the empty space between Booker’s thighs. His hands smooth over the Italian’s hips, drawing him close enough that he can drag his lips over Nicky’s alabaster skin. He smells so good, tastes so good, that Booker can’t help but dream of swallowing him whole.</p><p>“<em>Libretto</em>,” Nicky says in one rushing breath, soft as a whisper, as he fists both of his hands in Booker’s hair. “Tell me you’re ours…”</p><p>It’s pure agony, having to drag his mouth away from Nicky long enough to stare up at his ocean-blue eyes. But the moment he does, he’s immediately caught in that quiet storm. It takes Booker a moment to remember the request he’s been given, but the moment it catches up with him, it tumbles from his mouth as easy as anything he’s said. “I’m yours,” Booker rasps. “I’m yours. I’m Joe’s. <em>Always</em>.”</p><p>His world spins as Nicky bears him back to the mattress, settling his weight around Booker’s waist. “We should have done this in Sanremo,” Nicky says, hunching down to let their mouths meet. He tastes like espresso and the faintest hint of sambuca, smells like Joe’s hair oil still clinging to his fingers, and how is this even real? “We’ll take you back,” he promises against Booker’s mouth. “We’ll do this all over a thousand times if we have to, just to get it right.”</p><p>Booker breaks the kiss, breathless and yearning, and all he can say is, “I don’t need it to be right, I just need you and Joe.”</p><p>Nicky’s mouth curls into a hint of a smile and God, he is so beautiful it hurts sometimes. “We will still make this good for you, then, Sébastien,” he says as Joe’s hand runs over the inside of his thigh. “This and every time after.”</p><p>It’s a dream. This <em>has</em> to be a dream. Maybe he drifted off at some point and died in his sleep and this is only happening in his head. He hasn’t deserved this but he’s been given it and Booker wants to ask questions, ask why, but then Nicky’s kissing him again and pushing him further back up the bed and all those questions die on his lips.</p><p>Joe settles at his head, warm hands stroking through Booker’s hair and a reverent expression on his face. He remembers when the other man would only look at Nicky like that but now Booker’s being graced with it as well.</p><p>He <em>has</em> to be dreaming.</p><p>But no dream has ever felt like this, with Nicky kissing his way down Booker’s abdomen, his broad hands steady and sure against his hips. “You’re so perfect,” he says, so soft that Booker barely hears him, but the words sink in anyway. “I want you to know that, Sébastien, even if I have to say it a thousand times.”</p><p>Nicky’s nose traces lower, brushing against the growing bulge in Booker’s underwear, and Booker can’t help but swallow back a gasp.</p><p>“No,” Joe hums, his brow furrowing together, carving lines in the copper skin of his forehead. “No, don’t hide from us anymore. We want to hear you. We want to know this is as good for you as it is for us.”</p><p>Booker’s eyes tilt up to meet the older man’s and he swears he loses what little breath he had at the outpouring of devotion in Joe’s face. He nods, stomach tightening as he lifts his hips enough for Nicky to remove his underwear. “Okay,” he says, swallowing back the lingering bits of fear and self-loathing left in him. “Okay, I trust you…”</p><p>Joe’s fingers tighten in his hair and it’s like those single words are the most important ones he’s said since they fled the hotel in Morocco.</p><p><em>I trust you.</em> No more lies, no more hiding, no more running. He <em>trusts</em> them.</p><p>Nicky’s wide palm wraps around his cock, dryly stroking Booker a couple times before he looks up at Joe. “Drawer, please <em>amore mio</em>.”</p><p>The older man obliges, releasing Booker just long enough to dig through the bedside drawer for a bottle of lube. Booker spreads his thighs out of habit or anticipation—he isn’t quite sure which is which anymore—and hisses when Nicky’s fingers caress the thin skin in the very inner creases of his thighs. “<em>Merde</em>…” he groans, already growing restless.</p><p>“Shhhh,” Joe soothes him, bending down to kiss him. Their tongues slip together, the angle awkward and messy, but it’s so perfect that Booker has no complaints. “Be patient.”</p><p>One of Booker’s legs shift as Nicky pushes his thigh up higher, spreading him wider and allowing himself better access to the most sensitive places Booker has. “Let him be eager, Joe,” the Italian teases, no venom in his voice. “I know he wants it as much as we do, don’t you Sébastien?” The first slick fingers trail between the cleft of his ass, over his hole, and Booker’s breath stutters into a shaky moan. Nicky chuckles quietly and kisses the inside of his knee, so pleased with himself. “See?”</p><p>“It’s because it’s taken so long,” Booker chokes against Joe’s lips.</p><p>Both of the men freeze and he realizes what the implications are. The still-raw center of their tender relationship. Every kiss, every caress has slowly removed those knives that the last sixty years have caused but they’re still bleeding—Booker can’t deny that. Joe’s dark eyes search his own and Booker can see the question carved in the anxious expression on his face. <em>Are you still furious with us?</em></p><p><em>No.</em> He could never hate them, never stay mad at them for long, not as long as they stay right here with him until their final days.</p><p>“I’m okay,” he says, nodding carefully. “As okay as I can be.”</p><p>Joe’s thumb brushes over Booker’s bottom lip, over his beard, and down the line of his throat. “I hope someday you’ll be <em>better</em> than okay,” he murmurs. “But in the meantime…”</p><p>Their lips meet just as Nicky’s fingers brush over his hole and Booker’s moan disappears into Joe’s mouth before it even hits his ears. It’s different than in Marrakech—more intimate, more raw. This time Booker’s sober enough to feel every nerve ending, every press of Nicky’s broad fingers as the Italian works one inside him. It feels like flames licking up through his body, sparking from the perfect burn of Nicky’s finger, and Booker is suddenly floating.</p><p>His mind goes untethered and quiet. He focuses on Joe’s hands stroking his face, Nicky’s teeth nibbling on his hipbones, and the steady, heaving breaths that slip from his own mouth. Booker’s eyes sag and he barely even notices when Nicky slips another finger inside him.</p><p>At least, until they curl up directly against his prostate.</p><p>His hand flies down to fist in the sheets and Booker’s back arches off the mattress, chasing Nicky’s fingers in hitching rolls of his hips. “F-Fuck…” he groans, his cock jumping against his stomach. “Fuck, N-Nicky…”</p><p>“You scared us, you know, running off like that,” Nicky murmurs, working his fingers in and out of Booker’s body. “We came back and you were just gone. I thought you had maybe gone back to Marseille or disappeared somewhere else entirely.” He places a warm kiss just below Booker’s navel, the high rise of his cheek bone brushing along the head of his cock. “We thought you had decided you didn’t want us.”</p><p>“No,” Booker moans, shaking his head. “I just—I was scared…” Joe’s hands trail over his chest, nails scratching lightly over his nipples and making Booker gasp. “I’m s-sorry…”</p><p>“You don’t have anything to be sorry for, Sébastien,” Joe says, pinching the bud lightly as Nicky curls his fingers again. They’re working as a team again, sharing one mind, one soul, and suddenly Booker is part of it—being read and reading every twitch of their faces, every breath and smile.</p><p>“You’ve apologized to me about it, and to Joe. Andy and I have dealt with the man you were going to meet so there’s nothing to go back to. It’s just us.”</p><p>“What if it’s not the end of it?” Booker asks, mouth falling open and brow furrowing as a third slick finger enters his body. He doesn’t know how Copley’s been ‘dealt’ with, but knowing Andy… “What if—”</p><p>“Then we’ll deal with this together, like we’ve always done,” Joe says, kissing Booker again.</p><p>Kisses him and kisses him until they’re both breathless with it and Booker is painfully hard and leaking against his stomach. Until his hands are scrabbling for Nicky’s hair and Joe’s shoulder and he can truly never get them close enough to be satisfied. “Please,” he begs against Joe’s lips, dragging the older man closer to him. “I want you in my mouth…”</p><p>Booker knows his face flushes the moment the words come out and the blush darkens when Joe pulls away, eyes almost black with need. His lips are swollen from kissing and his perfectly twisted curls is now mussed, but Booker has never seen him look more beautiful. Joe glances at Nicky for a split second before he asks, “Are you sure? I know you haven’t…” A breathless laugh breaks the awkward silence. “I know it’s been a while.”</p><p>“I want it to be you,” Booker says, pressing his face against Joe’s thigh and breathing in the soft soap smell clinging to his skin. His thighs shake as Nicky’s fingers make a particularly wicked twist and he looks up at Joe desperately. “I <em>wanted</em> to, in Almería—I just didn’t—”</p><p>His voice breaks off and Booker blinks back tears as Nicky’s hand stills inside him.</p><p>The realization begins to sink in that they’ve all kept secrets from one another, all held back the truth because it was easier that way, It’s something Booker knows has been on Nicky’s mind since their phone call, on Joe’s since the evening in the cemetery, on his since the moment he had seen them outside the airport in Morocco. They’re all in a tender armistice and there’s only one way forward.</p><p>Joe lets out a heavy breath and nods, shifting to wrap a hand around himself. “Okay, Sébastien, if that’s what you want.”</p><p>Booker watches with bated breath as Joe strokes himself to full hardness, fist loose and slow as he savors the feeling. He’s just about to open his mouth to complain about Joe taking his sweet time when Nicky suddenly begins thrusting his fingers again, making every muscle in Booker’s body spasm with pleasure. “Oh fuck, <em>Nicky!</em>”</p><p>“Mmm, just wanted to make sure you were still with us,” the Italian teases dryly, a deadly sparkle in his unwavering expression. He pulls his fingers free just long enough to add more lube and Booker’s eyes roll back into his head at the unbearably perfect slickness. “Good?”</p><p>He nods quickly, coming back in bits and pieces as Joe’s cock brushes over his lips. Booker looks up at him, all his too-loud thoughts going quiet when he sees the other man look down at him like he had hung every star in the sky just for Joe. Booker wets his lips with the tip of his tongue and swallows down any lingering nervousness before wrapping a hand around Joe’s thigh and taking him into his mouth.</p><p>It’s a strange feeling, one that lingers in Booker’s mind like an old forgotten memory, but suddenly Joe is gasping above him and all his insecurities disappear in the blink of an eye. “F-Fuck, Sébastien…” Joe moans, bracing himself with one hand on the headboard. “Your m-mouth.”</p><p>One of his favorite things had been pleasuring Heloise like this, seeing her writhe above him, and watching Joe is no different. Booker’s almost unaware of his own pleasure as he tongues along the throbbing vein of the older man’s cock, breathing hard through his nose. He hollows his cheeks in a tentative suck—the bitterness of pre-come blooming over his tongue—and Joe’s hips rock forward almost on autopilot.</p><p>Booker chokes a little at the sudden intrusion, eyebrows furrowing as Joe pulls out of his mouth. He shakes his head, rasping, “It’s okay, I don’t mind.”</p><p>Joe’s hand clenches the headboard so hard that his knuckles pale, his other hand gripping the base of his cock like he’s trying to settle himself. “Are—are you sure?” he breathes, swallowing thickly as Booker nods.</p><p>That quiet noise starts back up in his mind as Joe shifts forward again, allowing Booker to wrap his mouth around the head of the other man’s cock. The angle is hard on his neck but the feeling of being so full is something he wasn’t expecting to be so perfect. Joe’s cock in his mouth, Nicky’s fingers in his ass, and all Booker’s brain screams at him is a single word—<em>more.</em></p><p>He barely even notices as Nicky sinks a fourth finger in him until the Italian’s knuckles hit his rim at just the right angle and Booker swears he sees stars. He muffles a moan around Joe and suddenly the older man is pulling out with a heavy hiss. “Fuck, Sebastien…” Joe groans, his chest heaving, abs tightening, as he shakes his head. “I’m not going to last if you do that again.”</p><p>“I think he’s ready anyway, <em>amore mio,</em>” Nicky murmurs, the lilt of his accent stitching his vowels together like a melody. He rises up just enough to catch Joe in a quick but messy kiss—Booker helpless to do anything but stare up at them in awe—and move out of the way for Joe to take his spot between his legs. Nicky settles at Booker’s side, back propped up against the pillows as his foot brushes over his hip, his side. Goosebumps rise and a shiver runs up Booker’s spine as he hears Nicky say, “Go ahead, Joe…”</p><p>A low groan slips from Booker’s mouth as he feels Joe’s fingers brush against his slick rim in almost meticulous inspection. “Please, Joe…” he begs. He’s not going to last long, not at this rate, and he knows the other man isn’t either. Booker wants to savor every second he’s allowed of this, even though he knows this is the first night of many to come.</p><p>He still wants it all.</p><p>Joe’s dark eyes wash over his body, his face, in an almost hungry way and Booker really has forgotten how good it feels to be wanted like this. To be yearned for. It lights every candle he’s been burning at every window for decades and, at this rate, the whole house of his soul is going to catch fire before he realizes it.</p><p>Booker lets out a shaky breath as Joe shifts, his left hand smoothing down over his thigh before steadying himself on the mattress as his right holds his cock steady, pressing the head at Booker’s entrance. It’s a teasing rub, just enough pressure to make his head fucking spin, and Booker can’t help but roll his hips down in an effort to spur the other man into action. “Please, Joe, just do it, please…”</p><p>He doesn’t even care if he’s babbling at this point anymore. Maybe it’ll all be worth it as long as Joe just fucks him like Booker wants him to.</p><p>But Joe doesn’t. He <em>stops</em>. <em>Hesitates</em>. Drops himself low so their chests press together, their faces inches from one another and he’s close enough to brush his lips across Booker’s as he murmurs, “I love you <em>so</em> much Sébastien. You and Nicky are everything to me.”</p><p>Booker blinks a little, dizzy and breathless under the weight of their love as he nods minutely. “I love you too,” he croaks, throat dry as sandpaper. “I <em>love</em> you.”</p><p>And then, everything in his body turns to pure golden fireworks as Joe suddenly pushes in in one slow, fluid motion. Booker’s eyes roll back into his head and his mouth drops open into a wordless cry as he grasps Joe’s shoulders, his arms, any inch of skin he can get his hands on. One foot slips on the soft sheets as the other shifts up, bumping against Joe’s calf in an effort to pull him closer.</p><p>They’re both breathing so hard, sharing the same air, and Booker can’t imagine it any other way. He can’t feel anything but the overwhelming fullness of Joe’s cock inside him as the older man bottoms out, their hips meeting in a rolling grind.</p><p>“F-Fuck…” he pants, hair sticking to his temples from the light sheen of sweat. “Joe…”</p><p>“I know, I <em>know</em>.” Joe’s trembling too, trying not to move any more than Booker wants him to, and his pupils have swallowed any umber left in his irises. It’s perfect and raw and desperate and Booker just wants him to fucking move. “Can—Can I?”</p><p>“Please, God, yes,” Booker groans, his words cutting off as Joe finally pulls halfway out and buries himself back in in a sharp snap. Any other words he could’ve managed get lost as Joe kisses him needfully, all teeth and tongue and nothing else.</p><p>This and this and nothing but this. How did he manage all these years? How could he ever breathe before experiencing this? God, how was Booker even alive before he knew what being loved like this was like?</p><p>Being fucked by Joe is different than when Nicky had done it in Marrakech. It’s smoother, more intimate, more lyrical in a way. Joe fucks like he fights, in one continuous motion from his mouth to his hands to his hips—everything moving in perfect synchronization. There’s not one beat out of rhythm, nothing but endless wave after wave that leaves them both breathless and shaking and drowning. “You don’t even understand it,” Joe groans around Booker’s tongue. “How long I’ve been waiting for this.”</p><p>“I’ve been waiting longer,” Booker croaks back, the faintest hint of a smile on his face. Enough of one that Joe catches the motion before he kisses Booker harder than before, if nothing else but to shut him up.</p><p>He’s so wrapped up in the world that the two of them have created that Booker barely notices the moan that slips from Nicky’s mouth until it hits his ears. He breaks away from Joe just enough for his gaze to drift over to the Italian next to him, everything going hazy as he sees Nicky’s half lidded eyes and flushed face.</p><p>Booker’s heart skips half a dozen beats when he sees one of Nicky’s hands wrapped around his own hard and leaking cock, the other between his legs as he fingers himself in shameless abandon. He says something in Ligurian, something that makes Joe’s rolling thrusts stutter for just a second, before turning to Booker. “I want to ride you, Sébastien…” Nicky moans, the muscles in his forearms tightening as he curls his fingers inside himself. “While Joe fucks you, I want to ride you, <em>Libretto</em>…”</p><p>If his own erection hadn’t flagged to half-mast while Booker was so distracted by Joe kissing him, he arguably would have come right then and there, so he’s counting his blessings while he can. He can’t even get the words out and only nods dumbly at Nicky in absolute acceptance.</p><p>A small grin flashes over Nicky’s bitten-red mouth and Booker is so far gone on both of these men that he can’t even begin to express it.</p><p>Joe’s hand wraps around his cock, dragging Booker back out of his head and into the present with a sharp rush of pleasure coursing through his body. His long artist’s fingers seem to know every spot, every stroke, every bit of pressure to drive him absolutely wild and maybe Joe’s been inside his head this entire time too.</p><p>“Come here, Nicolò,” Joe murmurs, shifting up onto his knees to make space for the other man. The change in angle makes Booker’s forehead pinch tight and a shaky moan to slip from his lips as he watches Nicky slips his fingers from himself and crawl over on the bed to kiss Joe.</p><p>Booker wonders if Nicky can taste him on Joe’s tongue, wonders if he’ll be able to watch them kiss as they take every little piece of him that they can.</p><p>If this is just another death, then what a death it’ll be.</p><p>But the moment he truly gets to enjoy the truly unbelievable sight of Nicky’s ass, it disappears as the Italian turns towards him, leaning forward just enough to kiss Booker on the mouth before he throws a thick thigh over Booker’s hips and grinds himself back on his cock. “F-F…” Booker stammers, unable to form words at the cresting pleasure. “Nick…Nicky…”</p><p>“Patience, my love,” Nicky hums, wrapping a hand around Booker and settling him into a position he wants. “Just let me—<em>ahhh</em>…”</p><p>All the air rushes from Booker’s lungs as Nicky sinks down on his cock in one swift motion, the other man’s head thrown back against Joe’s shoulder. It’s too much. It’s going to be too much. Booker can’t breathe, can’t think, isn’t even sure his heart is working at this point—is only so aware of the way that Joe and Nicky have him so wholly that nothing else is left but the melting mush of his brain seeping out of his skull.</p><p>He must tighten around Joe because suddenly the older man’s hips snap forward off their rhythm again and his eyes close—eyelashes washing across freckled cheeks as he groans, “Sébastien…Nicolò…it’s too…it’s too much…”</p><p>Booker opens his mouth to agree with him but the words slur into a moan as Nicky’s hips twist in undulating rolls—smooth as they had been in Marrakech when he was grinding in Joe’s lap—and he knows all is lost. “You feel so good, Sébastien,” Nicky whines, rocking up and down and taking him apart at every seam he can find. “Almost better than you did around me…”</p><p>He shakes his head, the pillowcase sticking to the sweat-damp skin on the back of his neck, and finally manages a, “No. Not better.”</p><p>“No?” Nicky laughs as his flush begins to creep down his chest and over the hard buds of his nipples. “You like me better like this?” Booker nods, struggling to suck enough air in his lungs to keep the heavy push and pull between their bodies a continuous motion. “You like having both of us at the same time?”</p><p>“Yes,” he groans, his hands finding their home around Nicky’s soft hips. “Always.”</p><p>He’s never felt like this. It’s like every glorious moment in his life is being lived all at once, like every death he’s ever felt is happening simultaneously. This is not living or dying—trapped between Joe and Nicky—this is what eternity feels like.</p><p>Booker had never believed in God as much as Heloise had, but in this moment? In this moment, he swears he can see straight through the center of the universe and into the divine.</p><p>Everything seems to seep into slow motion as Booker watches Nicky and Joe’s mouths meet in a heated kiss above him, rocking in and out and around him in perfect harmony. They’re so beautiful, so perfect together, and Booker still doesn’t understand how they love him enough to have carved out the exact space in their relationship to fit him in. He has them and they have him and it’s going to be like this for the rest of their lives.</p><p>For eternity until their last days, whichever comes first.</p><p>It’s something he’s heard the two other men whisper to each other late at night after missions, after brutal deaths and in the throes of a healing injury—<em>“We go together or not at all.”</em> Andy had never been one to give him too much information about the brother their lost before Booker even knew him, only that Lykon had met his final death before she and Quynh had. It had given Booker hope in a strange way, knowing that he might not have to be the last to go, but now it’s a more painful thought than anything else.</p><p>He’s either going to go before Joe and Nicky and cause them all that tremendous grief or he’s going to have to be the one left behind once more. And Booker truly doesn’t know which one weighs more heavily on his heart.</p><p>He doesn’t even realize he’s crying until Nicky’s dazed eyes turn to him in panic. “Sébastien?” Nicky pants, slowing down the grind of his hips and reaching for his face. He doesn’t want to be without them. He can’t be without them. Booker sucks a heavy breath in through his nose as Nicky’s thumbs brush the salt from the corners of his eyes and temples. “Sébastien, look at us…”</p><p>“P-Promise me that we h-have time,” Booker stammers, gulping air like he’s drowning in a futile attempt to steady himself from falling further. “Promise m-me…”</p><p>Joe’s dark eyes are glassy as he leans over Nicky, brows knitted together in worry. They share a glance and there’s a sense of knowing that passes between them that Booker can’t quite decipher—like all this has happened before. It must be familiar because they don’t even push him further—demand an explanation from him—only soothe him as best they can.</p><p>“We have a long time, Sébastien, I promise,” Nicky says, brushing his hair back from his face. “Nothing’s going to happen to any of us.”</p><p>“It still stands,” Joe murmurs, fumbling for one of Booker’s hands and lacing their fingers together. “We go together or not at all. And that means <em>all</em> of us.” His voice is insistent as his grip is as he says, “Sebastien, look at me. <em>We go together.</em>”</p><p>Booker swallows back a creeping sob and nods shakily, trying to patch the words over every anxious worry he still holds. He hasn’t felt this whole in centuries and he’s forgotten what it’s like. The weightlessness as Booker lets himself fall back into the empty space Joe and Nicky have been saving for him for six decades. Every scar, every blemish, every ugly, broken part of him is loved not just because they feel a responsibility to love Booker regardless, but because they love <em>him</em> and that’s worth the work.</p><p>He doesn’t have to be perfect. They <em>still</em> want him.</p><p>Nodding again, Booker allows Joe’s hand to slip from his and curl around his thigh instead. Allows Nicky’s lips and teeth to nip and bite at the tender skin below his jaw. Allows that knot in his chest to slowly untangle as Joe’s hips begin their rolling thrusts once more, Nicky beginning to rock in his lap again.</p><p>Every push and pull, every thrust pushes Joe deep into his body and up into Nicky simultaneously. If Booker closes his eyes, loses himself to the motion, he can feel them both at once—can feel them taking control of his entire body and using him as they will.</p><p>It’s so much and not enough, all at the same time.</p><p>Maybe Booker is selfish. Maybe he’s allowed to be selfish, making up for lost time and all that. Taking every gift he’s given—the dimpling of Nicky’s ass as the Italian fucks himself down onto Booker’s cock with gasping, high pitched whines; the snap of Joe’s hips against his as the thrusts pick up speed.</p><p>“Joe,” he gasps, unable to do anything but grab hold of both of the men above him and go along for the ride. “Nicky, fuck…”</p><p>“I’m not going to last,” Nicky says, his forehead pinched tight as his pale blue eyes flutter shut. He braces one hand on Booker’s chest as the other wraps around his cock. Booker watches in a hazy glow as Nicky’s hand works over the shaft, the head of his dick red and leaking whenever the foreskin pulls back on the downstroke. Watches the junction of his thighs where his own cock disappears into Nicky’s body with a slick squelch. “I’m gonna—I’m gonna—” Nicky gasps, breathless as one of Joe’s arms sneaks around his chest, long fingers wrapping around his pale neck and squeezing gently. “<em>Libretto</em>, keep going, I’m—I’m almost—”</p><p>“Nicky, <em>no</em>,” Booker pants desperately, his own orgasm quickly building. “Wait—”</p><p>But before he can finish his sentence, a shudder rolls through Nicky’s body, heavy and crashing like a wave, and he spills in thick ropes across his fingers and Booker’s stomach with a wavering moan. He clenches down but never stops the motion of his hips, not even when Joe puts a hand square between Nicky’s shoulder-blades and pushes him forward against Booker’s chest.</p><p>“Ohhh <em>cazzo</em>, Joe!” Nicky hisses as he presses his face into Booker’s shoulder, only a thin sheen of sweat separating the two of them. “Sébastien, <em>per favore</em>…”</p><p>“Give him what he needs, Nicolò,” Joe grunts behind clenched teeth as he uses Nicky’s body as leverage to fuck harder into Booker—pulling him back as Joe drives his hips forward. “Give our boy everything, <em>ya amar</em>…”</p><p>Booker shakes underneath Nicky, underneath Joe, and isn’t sure if he’s going to be able to take everything they want to give him. He’s so overwhelmed that he can barely breathe, barely think. How could he possibly be expected to take more? But Nicky’s fluttering heat is so tight around his cock and Joe’s thrusts are glancing off his prostate in the most perfect way that Booker knows it’s all over for him.</p><p>He rocks up into Nicky’s ass and down onto Joe’s cock in the little space they’ve given him, lungs heavy and aching as he gulps for oxygen. All of his moans are short and cut off, dying in his throat before Booker can even get them out fully, and he shakes his head futilely. “I c-can’t…” he stammers, his orgasm dragging him to the edge of the precipice. “Joe, I—I can’t…”</p><p>The older man leans forward, pinning Nicky between the two of them, and drives himself deep into Booker’s ass. “You can,” Joe says, his left hand gripping Booker’s face, his long fingers wrapping around the base of his skull. “I’ve <em>got</em> you, Sébastien. I’ve got you both.” Joe’s dark eyes are insistent, grounding, and Booker knows he could fall for an eternity and these men would always be there to catch him. Their mouths meet in a heated, sloppy kiss—Joe’s teeth nipping at his lower lip as he demands, “Let go.”</p><p>Gold spills across the back of his eyelids as Booker clenches them shut, his orgasm tearing through him like the sharp end of a bayonet. Everything inside him spills in a sudden rush as he comes hard into Nicky. His fingers dig into Joe’s shoulder and Nicky’s hips, and Booker can barely register the throb of Joe’s cock inside of his own body as the older man comes just a few seconds behind him.</p><p>All he knows is that he’s safe and loved and nobody can ever take that away from him now.</p><p>Booker comes back in bits and pieces, his breathing slowing as he trembles from overstimulation. Nicky’s weight is heavy on his body, Joe barely holding himself up enough to keep from crushing him completely. None of them move for a few moments—nobody willing to be the first one to untangle from the other two—until Joe finally leans in, kissing Booker chastely before pulling out and collapsing beside him on the bed.</p><p>His eyes are exhausted, half-lidded as his head lolls over to look at Booker with a tired grin. “Was that okay?” Joe croaks, words cracking around his fatigue.</p><p>Booker cracks an eye open, nodding weakly as he strokes a hand over Nicky’s bare back. “Yeah…” he mumbles, his own weariness finally settling in as the Italian finally shifts, pulling himself free.</p><p>Nicky’s flushed and dazed face appears as he sits up gingerly, his broad hands smoothing over Booker and Joe’s chests in careful succession. “You two stay here,” he murmurs. “I’ll go get some towels to clean up.”</p><p>Booker nods, unable to move as his limbs sink further into the bed. He doesn’t know how he’s still awake, how Joe’s even awake, but he lets himself drift for a moment. Joe’s hand slides across his bare stomach, curling around his waist as the older man’s eyes slip shut. Booker’s so tired that he barely registers Nicky coming back and cleaning them off until the damp cloth runs down between his legs, scrubbing him clean as best he can.</p><p>They’ll all need a shower tomorrow, but that’s a problem for another day.</p><p>“I love you,” he hears mumbled against his shoulder, Joe’s mouth pressed against his skin as the words slip from between his lips. “Love you Sébastien…Nicky…”</p><p>The room spins as Booker blinks his eyes open, taking one last look at Joe and Nicky as the Italian settles in bed on his other side. The sheets come up over all three of them and he sighs contentedly. “I love you both,” Booker whispers, Nicky echoing the sentiment not far after.</p><p>Their legs and arms and bodies tangle together in a mess of limbs and heartbeats and, for the first time in far too long, Booker feels himself settle. The world stops turning on the precarious axis of solitude they’ve created and everything feels right. There’s nothing to run from or run to anymore. He’s <em>there</em>. He’s <em>home</em>.</p><p>His eyes close and, for the first time in years, in decades, in centuries, there are no dreams, no nightmares.</p><p>Only quiet.</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you so much for staying through this fic with me! I really loved working on this sequel and letting Booker get the happy ending he deserved. ☺️</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Comments and kudos are always appreciated!</p><p>Come hang out with me at <a href="https://goldheartedsky.tumblr.com/">Goldheartedsky</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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